The MonsterBus looms larger than ever. Some 10 months after French territorial carrier Air Austral pencilled an order for two A380s configured for 840 economy class seats each it has signed the binding purchase contracts.
This story The Party Plane to Paris is on its way published here on January 16 has stood the time test [...]
Tag Archives: Airbus A380
Air Austral signs up for 840 seat party plane but gatecrashers are on the way
November 18, 2009 – 8:01 am
No sign of recovery for Singapore Airlines
October 16, 2009 – 12:29 pm
Singapore Airlines has not replicated the early signs of recovery seen in the comparable Cathay Pacific statistics in its operating results for September.
The airline boarded 10% fewer passengers in September than a year earlier (compared to a fall of only 2% for Cathay Pacific), and flew 7.9% less measured by revenue passenger kilometres. Singapore [...]
It’s a Jetstar a rising at Qantas
August 19, 2009 – 6:22 pm
The Jetstar ascendancy is now on in earnest at Qantas.
Qantas CEO Alan Joyce set the airline on course for major changes in his briefings at the full year financial results presentations today.
The three year $1.5 billion ‘Q Future’ cost reduction program is officially about more efficient practices in aircraft procurement and fleet utilisation and processes [...]
The Future-Boeing sees one, and it looks good
June 13, 2009 – 4:03 pm
Boeing is first out of the blocks this year with a new commercial market outlook or CMO.
The remarkable thing about these ritual releases is that despite predicting demand patterns which uniquely fit what Boeing or Airbus happens to make in terms of capacity or range, they always agree to within tenths of a percentage point [...]
This Delta connection is much bigger than announced
March 24, 2009 – 12:19 pm
There is context to the announcement of the interline agreement between V Australia and Delta which seems to have escaped the regurgitaters of airline press releases.
Delta, which eclipsed Southwest as the world’s largest airline in last year’s merger with Northwest wants United Airlines dead. Actually, deader than it is.
V Australia’s owner, Virgin Blue, has a [...]
V Australia, Brer Rabbit and the Briar Patch
February 26, 2009 – 8:31 pm
Virgin Blue might be playing Brer Rabbit pleading not to be flung into the Briar Patch over the misfortunes of its V Australia subsidiary.
The generally negative coverage given to V Australia’s ‘ruinously costly’ tilt at the Qantas dominated routes between Australia and the US doesn’t quit fit into the hole dug for it by the [...]
Gone at last. The biggest looser in the Qantas fleet
January 21, 2009 – 7:28 am
The last of the delay prone ‘classic’ era Qantas jumbo jets, a Boeing 747-338 left Sydney for the desert scrap heap at Marana, Arizona, last night. Its departure, a mere 45 minutes late, is believed to have been held up by air traffic control delays.
The jet built in 1985 spent much of its final year [...]
Why the Singapore Airlines Paris match could burn Qantas
January 20, 2009 – 11:44 am
Singapore Airlines has confirmed rumours that its next A380 destination is Paris.
The puffery that accompanies the announcement of daily links between its Australian flights and a new daily schedule for the giant Airbus between Singapore and Paris from 1 June doesn’t go into the strategic implications for Qantas but they are considerable.
Qantas has seen its [...]
The party plane to Paris is on its way
January 16, 2009 – 8:28 am
The locally obscure French colonial carrier, Air Austral, has sprung a big surprise on Qantas and Virgin Blue.
It has signed a memorandum of understanding to buy two giant Airbus A380s and use them the way the designers always said was possible, and fit each of them with 840 seats in an all economy class configuration.
Although [...]
Jetzilla meets the original V-jet
October 23, 2008 – 11:24 am
What a shame Qantas didn’t shine a bit more of the spotlight on the original article when its first A380 inaugurated commercial services by the giant Airbus at LAX this week.
That small object on the left in this photo by Joshua Bray is John Travolta’s own Boeing 707-138B, painted in the V-jet livery in which [...]
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