United Airlines will soon be resuming flights from Los Angeles to Sydney, Australia... though the flights will be at most 20% full. Airlines around the globe have cut most long haul routes due to both increased travel restrictions and a decrease in demand. We're slowly starting to see airlines add back long haul flights. Among…
Continue reading: Why United Airlines Is Capping Sydney Flights At 50 Passengers
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The 50 pax per flight capacity restriction at SYD is only supposed to remain in place whilst MEL is closed to international arrivals, in order to prevent MEL-bound services being rerouted to SYD.
This should lift before United resumes service to SYD, but I guess at least they’re planning for worst case scenario.
Tighter caps on the number of arrivals are coming on Friday, possibly with people entering having to pay for their own 14 days mandatory quarantine.
Melbourne has suspended arrivals and Perth is asking for tighter caps.
The cap at Sydney (and now at Perth) airport is as a result of Queensland (Brisbane) charging for hotel quarantines as well as Victoria (Melbourne) also charging but suspending international flights due to their current lockdown.
Because of this, authorities are concerns of an influx into Sydney and Perth where states are paying for the quarantine and entry is still permitted.
The Australian high commission in the UK has said this cap is planned currently till July 17th. This obviously may be extended.
Lucky, Sydney Airport isn't adding a cap to flights as you stated in the caption of the Qantas A330 photo.
It is being mandated by the NSW government.
Do you think United is expanding internationally to quickly in this pandemic?
I just saw they added a slew of European service.
I’m pretty sure United never stopped flights to Australia. SFO-SYD has operated throughout the pandemic. I know someone who flew to Sydney in March and returned in early June on that route.
Historically LAX-SYD has always been a HEAVY cargo route for UA...On more then one occasion I can remember announcements requesting volunteers because of weight/cargo, and that was on the 747-400...Also twice, I was in SYD and the ground staff was actively moving passengers from the LAX flight to the SFO departure due to the cargo going to LAX, again on the 747-400...
Ben, I'm surprised you haven't mentioned Nolinor's new leisure airline, OWG, or Off We Go. Pretty great livery, but not sure what the economics behind it are considering the state of the world.
If you look current flights - United is operating at least once a day cargo flights LAX-SYD... it's actually quite amazing the amount of cargo flights United has going on...
Disagree about easy upgrades. Anyone paying $$$ for biz will want a full row for distancing, so that limits the cabin from the get go. Would be insane to pack out the biz cabin and leave 2 people in the rest of the plane.
Good chance everyone gets a full row, though 3x3x3 is not great for poor mans biz, as the row is a little short to fully stretch out.
Pretty sure you meant that the SYD-LAX leg departs at 9:30AM (which gets in the same day a few hours earlier) - not 9:30PM
@ tom -- United doesn't block seats for distancing, unlike other airlines. So they absolutely would sell all 48 seats. That's United's policy.
I was on this flight on July 4th. I was originally booked YVR-HKG-SYD on Cathay but they cut their HKG-SYD flights the day I was to fly due to this cap. It was very eerie onboard, I believe we had 32 pax in total across all cabins. I was in the economy plus section with only 2 other passengers in the cabin. Was definitely a surreal experience but happy to be back in Sydney.
There is no point paying for business class when you can stretch across a row of economy seats.
Business or economy, I’d take anything, just hope us Americans are welcomed back sometime soon!
No, flying_foxy the reason is as lucky said, due to quarantine capacity, not because of competitive reasons with MEL.
Passengers intended for MEL will most likely go via Sydney now as that is now the main entry port for Australia.
@lucky, love your blog but your hypocrisy needs to be fixed. So Australia is doing great with COVID by limiting all international travellers but when China does the same, comments such as they are being unfair to US airlines and making it not possible for them to be profitable...
Don't expect upgrades to Business if this situation persists. Business will be closed altogether and the 50 pax will be socially distanced through Y. Right now it's a 'must travel' situation only, and must suck up sitting in Y. This makes sense for the airline.
@ tom — United doesn’t block seats for distancing, unlike other airlines. So they absolutely would sell all 48 seats. That’s United’s policy.
Wrong again. They will space pax among Polaris and Economy Plus, then tie down light weight freight in the economy seats.
I guess I just don’t understand who’s coming and going on those flights. As far as I understand it, Australians are banned from leaving the country, and foreigners are not permitted to visit unless there’s some sort of a grave emergency. What am I missing here?
@Marvella~ If your idea of 'soon' is sometime in 2021, you may be in luck. Your country is going to need a to a lot, lot, more to bring your epidemic under control and get to near elimination as we have done.
As luck would have it you have the opportunity in a few short months to take charge and vote Trump and his toadies out the door. If that doesn't happen , even god won't help you! Sorry.
To answer Brian, the passengers on these flights are Australian citizens, permanent residents and their immediate family members. Either passengers who have been overseas during the pandemic outbreak and are making their way home, or possibly citizens visiting critically ill family members. The people on the outgoing flight can be non-residents who are now returning home.
Also, all Australian states that have incoming international flights are now charging incoming passengers for the enforced 14 day hotel quarantine- around $AU3000 per adult.
We have booked economy flights from SFO to SYD for family of 5 for late Aug. We’ve heard that they might be cancelling tickets unless you upgrade to Biz class. Has anyone experienced this?
Just booked a seat (confirmed) on Delta to Sydney economy plus and now waiting to see if I get to go.Aug 7th dep.
Anyone else experienced getting bumped off because of cabin class preference ?
I know of people who’ve been bumped off Dubai-Brisbane (2nd last week in August) due to these limitations. The ticket was economy class but the bumping was supposedly ‘random’. Anyone heard of any biz or first class pax being bumped?
Does anyone know whether United is canceling flights to Australia? Have booked to return at the end of November. Thanks
Australians aren't banned from leaving the country Brian. But they do have to request and receive authorisation from Aust. Gov. to do so. There are limited reasons that are accepted as valid (leaving for 3 months or more is one of them, critical business is another etc). I flew out in Mar on these two reasons. A fair number of requests are turned down apparently. Aust Bureau of Statistics says 64k people (not all Aussies of course) departed Apr21, 107k in May. So there is still outgoing traffic.