Qantas' first non-stop Perth to London flight departing soon; tickets on sale

Qantas’ new Boeing 787 Dreamliner is slated to start daily non-stop flights between Perth and London on March 24, 2018. Tickets are reportedly on sale. In favour of its new service, the airline will axe its Airbus A380 flights from Melbourne to London via Dubai.

The West Australian reports that a return economy fare was offered for a “very competitive” $2270. The first flight in the 236-seat Boeing 787-9 will take off from Perth next year and will land at London’s Heathrow Airport. Qantas chief executive Alan Joyce revealed through the news outlet last month that flights from Perth to Berlin, Rome and Paris were the next nonstop routes on Qantas’ radar.

The Perth to London travels will start at Melbourne and will obtain both QF9 and QF10 numbers of the Melbourne-London service, according to the Australian Business Traveller. The travel will take 18 hours, the longest Qantas flight and the third-longest passenger flight worldwide.

Joyce was confident that the service would result to a new level of convenience Australians had not experienced before. “We’ve said the Qantas Dreamliner is a game changer and that’s now becoming real,” he said.

The new Qantas service makes it possible to link Australia and the United Kingdom in a single hop, which used to take four days and seven stops. Joyce said Qantas was aware that the Perth to London flight was long, but not much longer compared to the airline’s Sydney to Dallas service.

Additionally, Joyce said a “very high level of comfort” was added to each of the cabins and seat count was lower than most of their competitors. He also teased that Qantas is making tweaks to its in-flight service in order to assist customers in enjoying the journey even more.

The airline stretched its marketing partnership with Tourism Western Australia in order to maximise the tourism benefits of its latest service. “It’s great for Qantas and for Australian aviation, but a world-first route like this is also great exposure for Western Australia,” Joyce said.

WA tourism said it could add $9 million-$36 million a year into the economy of Western Australia. The amount would depend on passenger load. The state government invested $14million to upgrade domestic terminal T3 with border services.

Amity Travel’s Luke Chittock anticipated a high demand for the service, specifically in the premium cabins. He said an increasing number of passengers were asking for nonstops.

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