Big demand: faster Qantas needs two A380s and three Boeing 787s

It rises. In mid-October, Qantas announced that Proceed with the resumption of international flights for two weeks On November 1, 2021. Since then, demand has risen sharply. And so the Australian airline is directly increasing its offer.

This includes an earlier return of the Airbus A380. Originally, the Qantas behemoths were supposed to remain in the California desert until the end of 2023. In August, the airline announced that five A380s with modern cabins would return from July 2022 and fly to Los Angeles and London.

Two A380s and Three Boeing 787s Come Faster

Now it’s faster: Two A380s are set to begin flights to Los Angeles in April 2022. One plane could arrive as early as the end of 2021 and be used to train crews before flight operations resume. Three more A380s will be restarted from mid-November 2022, with the remaining five to follow by early 2024.

Qantas also intends to take delivery of three new Boeing 787-9s currently in stock at the manufacturer a few months earlier than planned due to increased demand. The Jetstar subsidiary will also retrieve the remaining five of its Boeing 787-8s from storage in Alice Springs in the coming months.

New route planned from Sydney to Delhi

Qantas and Jetstar will also increase their domestic routes and move forward with resuming more international flights to destinations from Sydney. This applies, for example, to destinations Singapore, Bangkok, Phuket, Johannesburg and Fiji. Flights to London and Los Angeles will begin on November 1, as previously planned, with links to Honolulu, Vancouver, Tokyo and New Zealand in mid-December.

In addition, Qantas plans to open a new route from Sydney to Delhi on December 6, 2021, if the authorities give the green light. Three return flights per week are planned with the Airbus A330. By the end of the year, the offer will be expanded to include daily flights and run until at least the end of March 2022.

Employees on leave can return

This is good news for airline employees. All Qantas and Jetstar employees in Australia and New Zealand who are on pandemic leave are expected to return to their jobs by early December. This includes about 5,000 employees in domestic air traffic and about 6,000 in international air traffic.

The accelerated return follows confirmation from the federal government and the NSW government that international borders will reopen from 1 November, as well as the NSW government’s decision to lift quarantine requirements for fully vaccinated travelers. In addition, there are plans by states and territories to open internal borders.