Qantas to open a Q400 base in Perth

[Jarden S]

There is an interesting discussion on Airliners.net Australian forum 47 with posts from Qantas employees (reputable sources imo):

They will open a Q400 base in PER later this year operated by the Eastern Australian Division with 3 aircraft initially to operate short range flights e.g. KGI and to some of the 11 soon to be de-regulated destinations to take on Skywest F50's and F100's head-on and open up new markets.
The contract with Cobham will not be renewed in 2012 and the 717 fleet will be absorbed back into the mainline fleet. This could enable the return of QF mainline back to LST, OOL and HTI. With the threat of DJ's new J seat it will be coming more of a problem of JQ not being able to compete in these markets.
Also related to the topic:
Qantas will base the first 5 new 73H with new IFE in PER for intra-WA flying this year to be used in the ZNE, PBO, KTA, PHE, KGI and BME routes ex PER. In total 14 to be delivered in the next 12 months 11 to Qantas and 3 to Jetconnect. We could expect an official press release coming out from Qantas soon?

http://www.airliners.net/aviation-fo....main/5109739/