There’s the three extra airframes stored in California. They haven’t been officially delivered to QF yet.

some 330SOs have already been recalled from LWOP

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Short, sweet, sadly spot on IMHO. :(

Understand the desire for some for things to settle for the "new normal" but anyone who expects Australia to open up to a pox ridden world on July 1st just to make AJ happy is going to be severely disappointed.

Be grateful if Domestic is anything like a "new normal" by then, International you're just dreaming.

A330 is forecast to take up the BNE-LAX. JNB rumoured to be going via PER also with an A330.

Crew are going to be the problem... particularly 787 and A330 Captains.

Ive heard the same re 330’s filling the void.

To all the Negative Nancy’s
AJ has a plan - There needs to be a starting point for the ramp up “when” it occurs. Will it be July 1? Who knows. Would we have a vaccine if you asked me back in April 2020..who knows?

Fast forward to today and the vaccine rollout is happening. Faster than anyone imagined. It’ll take time to get the uptake required but it’s only a matter of time.

Open the CBT my fellow colleagues 👍🏼

Technical Question

Do QF have any of the increased MTOW versions of the A332? Or at least any that can have the increases applied. I think it was increased to something like 237K or similar.

The old saying we all laugh at: " never buy the first of anything...."

You're heralding a new vaccine, development fast tracked and standard protocols diminished if not removed completely....what could possibly go wrong.

AJ can do what he wants - I can only trust that if ScoMo approaching mid year is presented with too many variables for the good of Australia he politely tells AJ to f**k off.

If that happens then you'll have all the returned LWOP/jobkeeper/had a job et al pilots/staff to deal with - but sure AJ has that all under control.:ok:

Hope I'm 100% wrong, just can't see the timeline working and reckon you're herding cats.

I say good onya AJ!
These politicians need a good kick up the backside. I mean the whole episode reads like something out of Fawlty Towers.
The only reason, and I mean the only reason, Australia is in a relatively good place is because when things starting going askew they simply closed the borders. It’s akin to amputating an arm to fix an infected finger. Bonehead logic but hey it works.
I’d say AJ has looked at the numbers and said July 1st is a good estimate to start international. Hell he needs revenue to start paying the bills. I don’t blame him. At least by stating this it starts putting the pressure on those who have the responsibility to open the borders ASAP.

Need to start somewhere may as well be July 1st a new financial year. AJ in my opinion is doing a good job others I’m sure will disagree. but the sh!t sandwich that has been delivered 2020 and 2021 I can’t think of an airline that’s as strong as QF group at the moment. This is his legacy and when he departs 2023 it’s all he will be remembered for, anything prior will be forgotten and he will want QF group to be bigger and better than ever.

No and yes.

I’m not sure any of us within Qantas expect to be flying passengers on 1 July. Whatever reasons they’ve used to decide to start selling tickets, actually flying passengers is likely to be lower on the priority list. Perhaps it’s to gauge demand. Perhaps it’s to get a few $$$ in the bank to assist with the ramp up. It’s certainly easier to tell people ‘the government said no, care to slide your booking’ than get bookings for flying in a month’s time when the borders finally open on bugger all notice.

So it’ll be the same in the lead up to 1 July as it is at the moment then?

I'm assuming to ramp up then people currently with second/third employers will have to chuck that in - will those employers take them back again?
Similarly depending on how Australia's travelling economy wise - what's going to be available regards (if any) jobkeeper etc?

If AJ is working on a serious intent and belief that International WILL substantially resume July 1st - time will tell, I'd disagree but hope to hell he's got it right.
If he's just going fishing/floating some ideas - could be a lot of unhappy QF boys and girls left in difficult positions.

But all that is somewhat irrelevant - it won't be AJ's decision whether QF International flies again July 1st it'll be the Feds.
Blame the Feds - first line of attack BUT if AJ's plans were based on blatently over optimistic or downright ludicrous assumptions then even his delightful Irish brogue won't save him from some, maybe many.

Last year when all this was kicking off we didn’t really expect it to last as long as it has, a few weeks at the most. Not many would have believed that the borders would still be firmly shut well into the new year. Now we are looking 6 months ahead and many people are saying that will be too soon.

Realistically, there will probably be some limited international travel permitted subject to conditions and restrictions. AJ can’t afford to wait indefinitely for a return to normality, and 1 July isn’t too near or too far. It could easily be brought forward or pushed back a bit subject to changing conditions.

Opening up the whole network for bookings is quite reasonable as tickets for the destinations which still can’t be served in the middle of the year can be refunded or rebooked. Leisure travel is more flexible as Fiji can easily replace Bali for example.

Waiting for things to get back to near normal before starting up again will cost the airline significantly as pax will have already purchased tickets on airlines which have maintained services, such as SQ and QR, instead.

It's not just the aviation and tourism sectors that are being smashed due to the border closures, its the universities due lack of international students and fees, farmers not getting workers, just to name a few.
The pressure to open up once the elderly, the vulnerable and essential workers are vaccinated will be to overwhelming from the Business sector for the Government to ignore and could be politically damaging come election time if it is to coincide with their inability to continue to keep things locked up.

I heard 4-6 a330s will be getting the 4t(?) increase in MTOW signed off FWIW

Also keep in mind a 789 seats 236. AJ has pointed out as long as the flight makes one dollar they’ll do it. Now come July when a 789 does SYD-LAX it won’t take too many seats to make that dollar.
I can’t see it being too difficult to achieving that.

There are enough crew current(ish) on the A330 fleet that for it to ramp up to even 60% ops wouldn’t take much additional training at all. The 787 would be a bit different but they’ll have enough information in April to know whether or not they need to be ramping up towards 10%, 30%, or 50%.

I suspect that most of us would be able to ‘make do’ on 50% and/or 50% is going to be close to more than what we were making full time on other jobs. Either way, depending on how the ramp up looks, I suspect there will be enough lead time and information available for people to decide if they want to be part of the 50% of the flying, or whether they want to hold off for a bit longer and be assured that the flying will be there to replace their other jobs.

How’s the 787 SYD base looking??
with the rumour 330 taking the BNE-LAX, I sense some considerable time in the lounge paxing up and down the east coast for the BNE base.

Just as it was pre COVID 😆

Why worry. The amount of flying being dished out to nsw/Syd pilots doesn’t see the need for a Syd base ever again. Brown paper bag anyone?

Whats the MTOW they would be able to bump the A330s to? 240t? Would that be enough for LAX-BNE?

That will obviously be another game changer,see if it is anywhere near as successful as the 1st a321p2f conversion,what could go wrong.

"Last year when all this was kicking off we didn’t really expect it to last as long as it has, a few weeks at the most. Not many would have believed that the borders would still be firmly shut well into the new year. Now we are looking 6 months ahead and many people are saying that will be too soon."

I wasn't expecting to be back at work for the rest of 2020 after my stand-down commenced last year.

And in all honesty, I don't expect things to get back to normal until this flu hype subsides. I doubt the vaccines will open up international boarders whilst there are still traces flaring up in different communities. Health bureaucrats only have a one track mind.

And this whole experience has taught me that politicians will go to any length to stop the spread of any virus, going forward, no matter how dangerous or harmless it may be.

Boarder or border?

One sleeps in a bed, one is an imaginary line between countries

Like a river?

Honestly who cares.....but yeah....thanks Dad.

Who cares? Our Ops manager does. If he finds spelling mistakes in your CV or cover letter, straight to the garbage/trash/bin it goes.

I'll keep that in mind should I desire a job flying a piston single in the middle of bum**** nowhere.

In the meantime, we all know what the guy meant so this whole circus of tears wasn't required. But i hope it made those involved feel important.

Well it is a prestigious badge for some


https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....5e84c29d1.jpeg

They're watching & waiting....

https://cimg2.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....54328d6b58.jpg

We fly 73s and 76s but thanks for your insight.

So flying light twins in the middle of nowhere! :E

well your ops manager is clearly a moron

Honestly, it’s not hard to spell correctly. But yeah, thanks pal

Oh really? 30 years of flying widebody and he is a moron? Checking people's spelling is not only a good way to assess attention to detail, but also gives an idea if the person is able to use all tools at hand to do the job better. Spelling mistakes on pprune when writing on a smart phone or tablet is par for the course but anyone thinking that nobody cares when writing for business or doing a job app is wrong.

Hi Climb150

Let’s hope your ops manager doesn’t ever get you to bite the bullet.

https://cimg9.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....82312e824.jpeg

Some ppl have a lot of time on their hands!

You have to explain that to me. Break it down real simple.

30 years of flying wide body ........oh......

Stop embarrassing yourself.

I am no English expert, but, someone better call 150 flight ops manager have him/her/they terminated for their spelling mistake and misuse of the English language. That could result in canceling the scenic flight over the Great Australian bight today.

What are you talking about? I didn't say I did. You realise I don't live in Australia anymore. Thank God I got away from this backwater mentality.