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Old 12th March 2020, 12:58 PM
Greg Hyde Greg Hyde is offline
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Qantas looks to delay Airbus A350 purchase for Project Sunrise

Qantas plans to delay the purchase of Airbus A350-1000 jets for non-stop Project Sunrise flights to London and New York as the coronavirus sweeps across the world.

Speaking with media following today's announcement of drastic cuts to the airline's international network, Qantas Group CEO Alan Joyce confirmed that he has asked Airbus for an extension to the March 31 deadline for ordering the aircraft.

“Airbus had given us the delay until the end of March," Joyce said. "That was based on the fact the slots were potentially valuable and could be sold to other airlines. We think in the current environment that may not be the case, nobody seems to be ordering aircraft.

"We would rather wait for the coronavirus issue to be out of the way before we put a firm aircraft order in for the A350," Joyce explained, adding that "we haven’t heard back from Airbus yet, but we’re hopeful we can try and get an extension.”

Qantas has already earmarked an initial order of up to 12 Airbus A350-1000s, which would be modified to include an additional fuel tank for making the 18-20 hour flights needed to connect Sydney and Melbourne to the likes of New York, London and Paris in a single globe-striding leap.

At a list price of US$366.5 million per jet, that represents a massive outlay of US$4.4 billion, although airlines typically receive a discount of up to 50% off the sticker.

Further A350-1000 orders could follow as replacements for Qantas' 12-strong Airbus A380 superjumbo fleet, eight of which will now be mothballed until at least September 2020 due to reduced travel demand in the wake of the coronavirus.

Although Qantas announced its Project Sunrise proposal in August 2017, and has dedicated years of research to the concept, the airline has yet to officially give Project Sunrise the green light, with that go/no-go decision previously due to be made by the end of March 2020.

https://www.executivetraveller.com/n...roject-sunrise
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