Qantas 747-800s?
 

Qantas 7550

QFA7550 / QF7550

Landing in 6 hours 20 minutes

HNL HONOLULU, HI -SYD SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA

took off from Daniel K Inouye Intl - HNL HST (6 minutes early) SATURDAY 14/08/2021 22:22 AEST

landing at Sydney – SYD FRIDAY 13/08/2021 16:55

Aircraft Type: BOEING 747-8 (quad-jet) (B748)
?????????????????????????

Atlas Air 747 under the QF callsign. There’s 2 or 3 operated for Qantas

For the umpteenth time - it is one of two belonging to Atlas Air on wet lease to QANTAS freight.

Uggh. 747-8. That's what it's called.

These boys and girls must be getting paid a small fortune to do this flying!

No money in freight! :ok:

Keep sleuthing Silver - the nod and wink gave it away - freight IS where the money is !!!

If you’re talking about the pilots, then yes, a very very small fortune :bored:

Head on back to the spotters forum Hillpig

Just saw an article yesterday where 2 744 converted freighters had been reactivated after 4 yrs or so in storage & sent for heavy maint before re entering service.
Somebody obviously thinks there are good $$$ to be made.

Well technically it’s a BOEING - 747-87UF


Depending on the route freight prices have increased anywhere from 100-500%.
What a lot of people don’t realize is how much freight is shipped on passenger aircraft.
Any aircraft large enough and equipped for pallets or containers will carry cargo as cargo is more profitable then a pax with an Economy seat.
Just for the sake of easy math let’s say that every international passenger flight carries two tons of freight.
The lack of 70 passenger flights would equal a -8F filled to the brim.
Now think of how that cargo gets to its destination with an 70-80-% decrease in passenger flights.
https://www.iata.org/en/iata-reposit...-presentation/

Even a helicopter operator is considering converting a 747 to a freighter. No money in freight?

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-07-30/aviation-company-looks-to-buy-qantas-jumbo-to-help-fight-fires

Don’t tell John Sharp but Qlink are going to run them across the REX routes!


No money in freight, somebody better tell Fedex and DHL!

Obviously need to explain the context of the ‘no money in freight’ comment again.

When Dixon was CEO and QF were facing a bit of a downturn- may have been SARS in ‘04- a question was asked of him (in a public forum if I recall correctly) as to why QF weren’t operating dedicated freighters. His response was “there’s no money in freight”.

Ever since that day whenever a QF crew see a freighter being loaded up chock a block, or hear a ‘Qantas’ (Atlas) call sign, or watch DHL or FedEx or Atlas cross the threshold in front of us, invariably someone who has been around more than a decade will exclaim ‘no money in freight’.

Yes, there’s money in freight. Truck loads of it. Qantas ignored it for quite a long time.

Not always the operator making the big money in freight, who controls the revenue that is loaded on the aircraft is making the money, in this case QF, ACMI rates for operators can only increase to a certain level, a lot of long term ACMI contracts for operators have been contracted before COVID so they have not seen the benefit yet...

Yeah, so much money that 60 pilots have resigned from Atlas in the last month. Heeeeaps.

Admittedly most of those people have class dates with FedEx, United and JetBlue etc.

…..and UPS.

Years ago, on a layover somewhere or other, we (Atlas) were chatting over a couple of beers in the hotel bar with a BA crew. The Capt had the opinion that as they were a proper airline they wouldn't reduce themselves to operating freighters. Hiring us to do it instead.

kika

It goes back further than that. I recall making a submission to TAA/Australian, about a plan to boost utilisation of the dwindling DC9 fleet around 1988. I got the classic "there's no money in freight". I think Dixon was still in TAA sales at that time. Infected with the same poisonous idiocy as that other Strong clown.
Maui

Further; many years later worked with an American colleague who related a story about having recently returned from 'NAM, received an offer to join, at about seniority #20, a small freight operation. Compensation was, initially, to include significant shares in said company. Knocked it back and regretted it ever since. Think Fedex. No money in freight, indeed!
Maui