As we’ve known for a while now, Qantas will be commencing flights between Perth and London as of 2018, which will be the world’s longest flight. They’ve been drawing out the hype surrounding this new route, and also surrounding their new 787-9, for quite a while.
Well, this flight is now on sale. Qantas will be launching daily nonstop flights between Perth and London as of March 24, 2018. The flight will operate with the following schedule:
QF09 Perth to London departing 6:50PM arriving 5:10AM (+1 day)
QF10 London to Perth departing 1:30PM arriving 1:15PM (+1 day)
The flight will cover a distance of ~9,130 miles in each direction, and the westbound flight will take 17hr20min, while the eastbound flight will take 16hr45min.
The 787-9 will be in a premium heavy configuration, with a total of 236 seats. This includes 42 business class seats, 28 premium economy seats, and 166 economy class seats. Qantas will have modified Vantage XL seats in business class on their 787s, all of which will feature direct aisle access and quite a bit of privacy. It’s similar to the seat they have on their A330s.
Per AirlineRatings, roundtrip pricing on Qantas’ new flight starts at 2,270AUD in economy, 4,250AUD in premium economy, and 9,725AUD in business class.
Qantas presently operates A380 flights to London from both Sydney and Melbourne, and those flights operate via Dubai (and Qantas has pick-up rights between Dubai and London, so you can fly them exclusively in the market if you’d like). In late March, Qantas will be discontinuing their current flight between Melbourne and London, since they think there’s not enough room for the additional capacity that’s being added. I wonder what route they’ll be using the A380 for instead.
Qantas has a joint venture with Emirates, and Emirates is increasing capacity between Melbourne and Dubai to make up for the lost capacity.
I hope to try this Perth to London flight at some point, though I’m not seeing any award availability as of now.
Presently the world’s longest flight is between Doha and Auckland, and it covers a distance about 100 miles shorter, so Qantas is just barely taking the new title here.
Have they brought up ORD - SYD non stop? This has been brought up in the past. Would there be enough traffic. There's DFW and the many flights out of LAX. I've seen online Emirates flies a non stop freight flight(777-200) once a year.
Oops. I meant SQ's SIN-LAX leg.....
QF PR exaggerates, methinks. Flight Aware has today's Qatar 921 westbound Auckland to Doha at 17hrs 35mins, 15 mins longer than QF's planned PER-LHR leg. And isn't SQ planning to revive their 18-hrs-plus SIN-LHR rotation?
Bragging rights aside, the 787-9 is a lovely plane and the trip in a business pew, along with their usually good service and nosebag, should be a reasonably pleasant experience.
Sydney Airlines has decided that F flyers out of Melbourne are of no consequence. What will become of the gorgeous Melbourne QF F Lounge? From next March, SQ Suites and the ME airlines will be the natural home for F flyers out of Melbourne who feel deserted by the national carrier.
I wouldnt wish this on my worst enemy to fly this flight in economy...my goodness
There's more award space from MEL.
https://www.ausbt.com.au/how-to-book-qantas-new-melbourne-perth-london-flight-with-points
Good luck in getting any award seats on that flight, it is so hard to get any business class awards on Qantas operated flights, I now think of my Qantas ff account and points as an Emirates or one world ff account
All flights out of Aus are expensive in comparison to purchasing them in the opposite direction. A number of people who fly to a regular destination will go one way, and then buy return tickets from the other end.
I'm disappointed with the scheduling of these flights as I quite enjoy the QF9 around midnight departure from Melbourne that then gets into Heathrow around lunchtime, avoiding the M4 carpark during morning peak. It allowed a...
All flights out of Aus are expensive in comparison to purchasing them in the opposite direction. A number of people who fly to a regular destination will go one way, and then buy return tickets from the other end.
I'm disappointed with the scheduling of these flights as I quite enjoy the QF9 around midnight departure from Melbourne that then gets into Heathrow around lunchtime, avoiding the M4 carpark during morning peak. It allowed a full day before leaving, even from Sydney with connected domestic and international terminals in Melbourne. However, I guess using the B787 means they can no longer rotate the metal with QF 1/2.
I'll probably try it once so that I can mark off the sectors, but like will probably fly someone else with better timed and priced flights.
You might have more luck with award availability of you follow the full flight from MEL to LHR via PER or vv.
No thanks it's already a painfully long flight from Australia with a stop - I'm yet to experience PE (in July ) with Singapore. Non stop in Economy I'd be suicidal
This will be longest Dreamliner flight and third longest flight. Pricing wise.. welcome to Australia...we get robbed blind!
According to ABT they are considering MEL-HKG/SIN for the A380. So maybe, since, you know, SQ will be launching SIN-JFK/LAX again in 2018, and PAL will be flying JFK-MNL non-stop with the 359 this year or in 2018, you could plan an itinerary for those routes in one trip *he said hoping but knowing it probably won't happen at once*
@joey Yes the same plane is flying. MEL-PER on the way to LHR and then flys MEL-LAX on the return. Qantas want to maximise yields on all sectors. If you live on the east coast though (which most of the population does) LHR is already a 1 stop flight, so aside from getting to sit in a new Perth QF lounge during transit - I don't know what the big deal is, especially given they have such an average hard product and an inconsistent soft product.
The extra A380 from the MEL service will be utilised on the SIN &/or HKG sectors
Too long for me :)
Lucky, Any new updates on the upcoming flight between EWR-SIN on SQ?
@keitherson I flew ATL-JNB on SA back when that was the longest flight. It was on a 744 and could only fly out half full of pax due to the distance. On the way back it made a refueling stop in SID (Cape Verde).
It'll be longer as they’ll divert barely to keep away from Crimea and the precise flight distance will be marginally higher. Gary Leff wrote about it a while back.
Lucky, my shout for Dinner when you arrive here in Perth. Como Treasury for sure. See you soon?
I'm always wondering the pricing for flights originating from Australia.
That's 6600 EUR for a return trip in business class. When I look for flights from Helsinki to Australia, they are normally 3000-3500 EUR, I start to consider them whe they go below 2500 EUR and I've often bought them under 2000 EUR. (That's airlines such as Qatar, Finnair/Cathay/Qantas, etc)
I flew bne-syd-lax-dfw with a 7 month old day flight. One of the worst flight experiences of my life and it was Qantas business. Pretty sure economy would have killed me. I fly ryan air from stn often but for brutal long haul even premium economy does little.
Almost 10,000 AUD for business class tickets.
Pretty insane pricing IMHO.
That's an awfully long time to be in a tin can... Glad they're putting in extra premium seats -- I don't know that this is one Y flyers should even consider.
Isn't QF also using the same aircraft for one domestic flight MEL-PER each day? It would then continue PER-LHR and perhaps that's why they're discontinuing the A380 on the MEL route.
Personally, MEL-DXB-LHR sounds like a better route to me than MEL-PER-LHR.
Haha I live near UK. I would literally turn down this flight for free with my 2 year old. Economy obviously. This is my nightmare with a child that refuses to sleep on planes, otherwise she's amazing.
i came up with the same figures that DOH-AKL is *just* a tiny bit longer than PER-LHR.
Probably going to be a nightmare in Y.
oops nvm
"QF09 Perth to London departing 6:50PM arriving 5:10AM (+1 day)"
Isn't it +2 days?
According to GC map, PER-LHR is 9,009 miles while DOH-AKL is 9,032 miles, so I'm wondering where they are getting their calculations, as it seems the QR flight will continue to be the longest, or am I missing something here?
My GC Mapper is showing distance for PER-LHR 9,009 miles, making it 23 miles shy of the current world's longest route.
The world's new longest flight?
According to the Qantas press release, "The 14,498km flight will take approximately 17 hours (slightly more or less depending on winds).
When it launches, it’s expected to be the third-longest passenger flight in the world."
Can someone clarify?
Great Circle Mapper says this flight (9009 miles) is shorter than DOH-AKL (9032 miles), Alan Joyce says it's the third longest
Qantas has already said that the A380 will be deployed on they SYD/MEL to HKG/SIN routes.
Inaugural flight is zeroed out in business.
*Correction DFW-SYD
"So Qantas is just barely taking the new title here.*"
*Taking back the title, they lost on the DAL-SYD route!
I just looked up the flight on Qantas' website and the flight seems to be sold out in business, am I too late or am I just dumb?
What a year for ultra long haul. First DOH AKL and now LHR PER. When I flew SYD DFW it was still #1!