Because you don't get the point to point demand you get on UK-Australia anywhere else on the Qantas Network..... friends of mine in the UK always say they used to get far cheaper Australia bound tickets on QF (especially in PE and Business) if they flew to Amsterdam or Paris - now of course QF, like BA, have cut most of those other routes

Even Emirates is far cheaper out of Paris to Australia than out of London -

If there is anything to the rumours that QF will retire two of its A380s at their D-check (presumably OQA and OQB, since they are MSN 14 and 15 - I think I recall that Airbus had fixed it's production issues by about MSN 20?), then this could also reflect QF planning for ways in which it could adjust it's schedule to remove two A380s worth of flying. Replace QF1/2 SYD-SIN-LHR with a B787 SYD-PER-LHR. And perhaps put another A330 on SYD-SIN to handle regional traffic.

Pure speculation, building on others' rumours.

Qantas' Perth to London direct flight has been grounded at the 11th hour for the second time this month, with passengers asked to disembark after sitting on the plane for two hours.

The 17-hour flight, which departs Perth once a day, was scheduled to take off at 7.40pm on Wednesday evening.

WA member for Moore, Shane Love, who was booked on the flight, tweeted the journey was delayed because the crew was not provided with a flight plan.

"The captain has said he will not be able to fly in the 20 hours allowed and cancelled the flight!" he said.
Radio 6PR caller, Andy, said his wife, who was travelling back to Britain for urgent family reasons, had been caught up in the delay.

"They sat on the plane for two hours due to delays before they were told they would have to disembark," he said.

"They were given a taxi voucher to Metro Hotel.

"My wife is frustrated, she thought she'd be halfway to England by this morning."

A Qantas letter provided to passengers said the delay was due to a technical issue impacting the airline's ability to provide a flight plan.

"Despite the best efforts of staff, our technical crew have run out of allowable working hours under CASA regulations and they cannot operate this evening," it read.

"You'll now be leaving Perth tomorrow morning."

Andy said his wife had been rescheduled on a later direct flight departing at 11.15am on Thursday.

A Qantas spokeswoman said, despite the crew's best efforts, the delay in providing the flight plan - which was due to a technical issue not related to the aircraft - had a knock-on effect which meant the crew would exceed their allowable working hours.

"Passengers were provided with overnight accommodation, transport and meal vouchers," she said.

"There is no impact to today's regular scheduled Perth to London flight."

The delayed service comes a week after engineering issues cancelled the service on January 17 with passengers transferred to other flights within 24 hours.

The direct flight, which travels 14,498 kilometres, has been operating since March 2018 using the 787-9 Dreamliner.

Earlier in the week, Qantas chief executive Alan Joyce told Radio 6PR the new direct service to London had been a success for the airline and had generated $100 million in free publicity for WA.


https://www.smh.com.au/national/west...24-p50tcq.html

Yes, it departed PH about that time today.
Approx 45 pax only onboard as others elected to go with EK & QR last night... ouch!

https://www.watoday.com.au/national/...12-gt97yx.html

So that FREE publicity cost $14 million. What a nice round number $100 million is. It was probably calculated by the same Q accountant that calculates the Jetstar profits.

What a game changer.

Sounds like a weird explanation to me.

Do they not have reserve crew they could call out?

I would guess that the problem is that Qantas is a Oneworld carrier, and that the most logical second destination would be a Oneworld hub in Europe that is a bit closer to PER than is LHR. This would allow the collection of PAX from a large number of origination/termination points -- and make the flying range a little less extreme than to LHR. But the only OW hub satisfying the second requirement is HEL -- which is not a terribly convenient gathering point for the bulk of EU traffic. So LHR is likely to be the choice for any second service.

Moscow could be fun :ok:

If that was the case they'd reduce the payload, not cancel the flight!

Do those operators flight plan arrive at LHR with just above fixed reserves in those conditions? If so and they divert, can the crew continue do another sector to land at LHR?