British Airways to commence 787 service to Hyderbad in March 2014

by Devesh Agarwal

Image courtesy British Airways

Flag carrier British Airways will bring its latest aircraft, the 787-8 Dreamliner to India in the summer 2014 schedule which starts on March 30th. The aircraft has 214 seats in a three-class cabin layout with 35 business class seats, 25 economy plus, and 154 economy class seats. The aircraft features the latest cabin product of British Airways, though the economy class is the bone crunching nine-abreast seating.

Hyderabad will be the first destination in India, as the airline currently flies a daily 767-300 to the city with 189 seats in a three-class cabin layout with 24 business, 24 economy plus and 141 economy class seats.

The most rational explanation for the airline to operate the 787 to Hyderabad appears to be the similarity in size.

British Airways is also expanding routes using its new aircraft. Their A380 will begin flying between London Heathrow and Washington Dulles from September 1, 2014. The aircraft is already flying between London Heathrow and Los Angeles and Hong Kong direct, and will start services between London and Johannesburg in February 2014.

The airline's Boeing 787s will fly nonstop between London and Austin, Texas from March 3, 2014, Philadelphia, USA, from June 5 and Calgary, Canada from July 5, 2014. In addition to Hyderabad, the 787 will commence Chengdu, China as another Asian destination from May 5, 2014.

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Qatar Airways commences Doha Chengdu flights

by BA Staff

Doha-based Qatar Airways commenced scheduled thrice a week flights to Chengdu, the airline’s 130th destination and sixth in China, after Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Hong Kong and Chongqing. The airline now operates 41 flights a week to the country. The Chengdu route is operated with an Airbus A330 in a two-class configuration of up to 248 seats in Economy and 36 in Business Class. 

Qatar Airways A330 receiving the traditional water cannon salute on its first flight to Chengdu

Flight QR884 arrived at Chengdu Shuangliu International Airport to an impressive water salute, following its non-stop journey from the airline’s operational hub in Doha, capital of the State of Qatar.

Chengdu is the economic hub of western China, and the nation's electronics manufacturing and information technology hub. Chengdu is also growing in aerospace, metallurgy and petroleum. Qatar Airways flights will improve access especially from the mineral rich African nations China has been wooing for ore supplies, etc., and the flight schedules reflect the connectivity the airline is aiming for.

Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays
QR884 departs Doha at 02:00 arrives Chengdu at 14:30 hrs

Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays
QR885 depart Chengdu at 01:00 hrs arrives Doha at 03:50 hrs

Over the next few months, the network will expand with the addition of further destinations – Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (September 18), Ta’if, Saudi Arabia (October 2), Clark International Airport, Philippines (October 27), and Philadelphia, PA, USA (April 2, 2014).

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Maps: Potential United Boeing 787 operations for 2014

by Vinay Bhaskara

Image Credit: United Airlines

With the announcement of thrice weekly San Francisco - Chengdu to commence in June 2014, Chicago-based full service carrier United Airlines has the planned the following long haul routes for its fleet of Boeing 787-8 Dreamliners in 2014.

San Francisco - Chengdu --> 3x weekly
San Francisco - Osaka Kansai --> Daily
Seattle - Tokyo Narita --> Daily
Denver - Tokyo Narita --> Daily
Los Angeles - Tokyo Narita --> Daily
Los Angeles - Shanghai Pudong --> Daily
Houston - Lagos --> 5x weekly

Now in order to properly rotate aircraft from the 787-8's current base at Houston, it would also make sense for United to operate daily Houston-Denver and Houston-San Francisco flights domestically using the 787. Such an operation would fully utilize United's planned fleet of 11 Boeing 787-8s with frame utilization as follows:

1 frame - San Francisco - Chengdu
1 frame - Seattle - Tokyo Narita
1 frame - San Francisco - Osaka Kansai
3 frames - Los Angeles - Tokyo Narita and Los Angeles - Shanghai Pudong (a Houston flight can be added here as well to improve utilization)
2 frames - Houston - Denver and Denver - Tokyo Narita
2 frames - Houston - San Francisco and Houston Lagos
1 frame - Spare

The 787 will be primarily used as a trans-Pacific aircraft in 2014, with six of seven long haul routes focused on Trans-Pacific flights; all from the Western United States. The maps below outline the planned (and proposed domestic) 787 routes for United in 2014. It appears that the 787 has already begun to fulfill its promised role of expanding US-Asia air links as the 767 did on trans-Atlantic flights.

Trans-Pacific

Other

Maps generated by the Great Circle Mapper - copyright © Karl L. Swartz.

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United Airlines applies for San Francisco - Chengdu

by BA staff

A United 787 Dreamliner - Image Credit: United Airlines

Chicago-based full service carrier United Airlines announced today that it has applied with the US Department of Transportation (DOT) for the authority to serve San Francisco - Chengdu, China nonstop from 9th June, 2014.

The proposed flights to Chengdu, China's fourth largest city and home to China's fifth busiest airport by passenger traffic, would be served three times per week using Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner equipment. Subject to government approval, the proposed schedule for the flights is as follows. On Mondays, Wednesdays, and Saturdays, flights will depart San Francisco at 1:35 pm, arriving in Chengdu the following day at 6:50 pm the following day. The return flights from Chengdu will depart at 10:00 am on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, arriving back in San Francisco at 8:50 am the same day, in time for connections throughout the United States.

Chengdu becomes the eighth trans-Pacific destination served by United at San Francisco - already the single largest US carrier trans-Pacific gateway. Chengdu and San Francisco have strong business links owing to Chengdu's status as China's electronics manufacturing hub, and San Francisco's status as the world's largest technology business hub through nearby Silicon Valley. Chengdu also offers United the potential for connections throughout Central, Southern, and Western China via Star Alliance partner Air China, for whom Chengdu is the second largest hub. 

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Air China ends Shanghai-Chengdu-Bangalore

by Vinay Bhaskara

Yesterday, Sunday, August 4th, marked the final nonstop flight for Air China limited, the world’s 10th largest airline by passenger traffic, between Bangalore and Chengdu. Flights have been zeroed out from the global distribution system (GDS) and are no longer bookable via AirChina.com. The nonstop flights, which began in early 2010, had actually been increased in frequency by Air China from twice to thrice weekly on March 31st, and had been planned to operate as thrice weekly flights until late October. Service was offered on 128 seat Airbus A319 equipment in a 2-class configuration (8C/120Y), and was structured as Bangalore-Chengdu-Shanghai Pudong and return. Flights departed Bangalore Wednesday, Friday, and Sunday and arrived in Bangalore on those same days of the week after departing Shanghai Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday. The same plane journey from Shanghai to Bangalore took over 7 hours and 40 minutes to complete in either direction.

It is surprising that Air China elected to cancel services between Bangalore and Chengdu given the strong business ties between the two cities. Bangalore is India’s information technology (IT) hub, while Chengdu is China’s electronics manufacturing center; and several multinational tech corporations have major operations in both cities. In particular, this route was often dubbed the "Cisco-Huawei Express". Networking Equipment Manufacturer Cisco’s “East” Headquarters are located in Bangalore while their largest manufacturing base in China is located in Chengdu. Meanwhile, electronics manufacturer Huawei has a major IT research and development (R&D) center in Bangalore and massive manufacturing operations in Chengdu (as does rival Chinese telecom firm ZTE). These firms often formed the base of demand for the nonstop services, and when combined with the incremental demand between Bangalore and China’s financial capital of Shanghai, the route seemed to be a strong performer for Air China.

But global macroeconomic conditions have certainly shifted in the past few months. Both India and China are seeing slowdowns in growth that are causing tapering in travel demand between the 2 nations – as firms scale back expansion plans and begin to curtail employment growth. India’s projected GDP growth for 2014 has fallen to a new low of 5.2% (after running at 8% or above for nearly the last decade; even through the global financial crisis) tied to a similarly projected GDP growth for China of just 6.9% in 2014, the lowest total in more than 20 years. In addition to these macroeconomic factors, Cisco, a major US manufacturer of Telecom equipment, is also facing a major slowdown in its core market, the US, as firms increasingly turn away from its services and put off purchasing new network equipment due to uncertain economic conditions. Even in India, the economic slowdown is contributing to a reduction in demand for telecom equipment. All of these factors certainly contributed to a reduction in demand for the route.

Beyond the macroeconomic forces, there is increasing tension between China and India thanks to labor disputes and border issues in India’s Northeast. Additionally, ZTE and Huawei are coming increasingly under suspicion of playing a role, if only indirectly, in increased Chinese hacking of Indian government web servers, thanks to their close ties to the Chinese government. The added security concerns have led to increased scrutiny for ZTE and Huawei – and forced the two firms to cut back on their Indian operations. Given the relatively close ties between the Chinese government and Air China, these political disputes may have also played a role in the cancellation of the route.

Air China will continue to service India with 7 flights per week; 4 weekly Mumbai-Chengdu-Shanghai Pudong on board the same Airbus A319 equipment, and 3 weekly Beijing-Delhi on-board 301 seat Airbus A330-300 equipment in a 2-class configuration (30C/271Y). Beijing-Delhi had previously been increased to 4 weekly till October 26th, but those plans appear to have been scrapped.

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AirAsia X to increase services from Kuala Lumpur to Melbourne, Taipei and Chengdu

AirAsiaX the long distance arm of Malaysian low cost carrier AirAsia will increase its frequencies from its Kuala Lumpur hub to Melbourne, Australia, Taipei, Taiwan, and Chengdu, China from next year.

Melbourne services will see frequencies increase from the current daily flights to nine flights weekly by May 1, 2013 and to twelve flights weekly by July 1.

Taipei will go from daily flights to ten weekly flights from May 1, and double daily from July 1.

Chengdu will go from the current five flights weekly to six flights weekly by May 1, and daily flights by July 1.

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VIDEOS: The application of the "Panda Express" decal to a FedEx 777F

US cargo airline FedEx announced that it painted one of its aircraft with a special panda decal to commemorate the carrier's transport of two giant pandas from the Washington D.C. zoo to a natural reserve in China. The one-time transport flight was conducted in February of 2010 on one of FedEx's 777Fs.

The following video from the official FedEx YouTube Channel shows FedEx painting this decal onto the Boeing 777 freighter.

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Air China increases Bangalore operations, Lufthansa increases Mumbai Munich

From the Summer 2011 time-table which commences this Sunday, Air China is increasing its frequency on the Shanghai-Chengdu-Bangalore flight from two to three times a week. The Wednesday, Saturday arrivals with Thursday, Sunday departures will be complemented by an additional frequency arriving in to Bangalore on Mondays and departing early morning Tuesdays. Aircraft type continues to be an Airbus A319-100.


Lufthansa continues is expansion in India with two more frequencies on the Mumbai Munich route, making it a daily service, and taking the total of the Lufthansa group to 77 frequencies per week.


Lufthansa :

Delhi-Frankfurt: daily : Boeing 747-400
Delhi-Munich : daily : Airbus A340-600
Mumbai-Frankfurt : daily : Boeing 747-400
Mumbai-Munich : daily : 1,3,4,6 : Airbus A330-300 : 2,5,7 : A340-300
Bangalore-Frankfurt : daily : Boeing 747-400
Chennai-Frankfurt : daily : Airbus A340-300
Kolkata-Frankfurt : 3 per week (2,4,7) : Airbus A330-300
Hyderbad-Frankfurt : 3 per week (2,4,7) : Airbus A340-300
Pune-Frankfurt : 4 per week (2,5,6,7) : Boeing 737-800 Lufthansa Business Jet
(operated by PrivatAir)

Swiss :
Delhi-Zurich : daily : Airbus A330-300
Mumbai-Zurich : daily : Airbus A330-300

Austrian Airlines :
Delhi-Vienna : 6 per week (X2) : Boeing 767-300ER (B767)
Mumbai-Vienna : 5 per week (X4,6) : 2,3 : Boeing 767-300ER (B767) and 1,5,7 : Boeing 767-300ER (B763)

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• Virgin creates 450 jobs as new routes launched (dailyexpress.co.uk)
• Swiss cuts fuel consumption (abtn.co.uk)

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Airbus delivers first Chinese assembled A320 aircraft to Sichuan Airlines

Airbus today delivered the first A320 aircraft assembled at its Final Assembly Line China (FALC) in Tianjin. At a grand ceremony, the aircraft was handed over by Airbus President and CEO, Tom Enders, to the Chairman of Dragon Aviation Leasing, Li Hai. The aircraft will be leased to and operated by Sichuan Airlines.

The FALC is a joint venture between Airbus and a Chinese consortium comprising Tianjin Free Trade Zone (TJFTZ) and China Aviation Industry Corporation (AVIC). Eleven A319 and A320 aircraft are scheduled for delivery in Tianjin in 2009. Airbus is planning a production rate ramp up to four aircraft per month by the end of 2011.

Sichuan Airlines, established in 1986 and commenced commercial flights in 1988, was the first Chinese carrier to introduce the A320 aircraft in China back in 1995. and it started commercial flight operation in 1988. The new A320 will join the existing fleet of 40 Airbus A320 Family aircraft.

The A320 delivered today is a two-class configuration, with eight first class seats and 156 economy seats. The aircraft will be deployed on domestic trunk routes between the airline’s base of Chengdu to such major cities like Beijing and Shanghai. It will enter into service on June 24 on the route from Chengdu to Beijing.

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