Cedarjet From United Kingdom, joined May 1999, 7702 posts, RR: 55 Posted (10 years 11 months 1 week 1 day 23 hours ago) and read 1937 times:
Noticed in the 'First Flights To NY By Foreign Airlines' thread that Qantas first appeared in NY in the 50s with Constellations, and with 747 Classics in 1973. Here is my understanding of QF's round-the-world routings, but hoping some of you know more, especially re the 747.
Don't know how the Connies (or 747s) made their way to JFK, but in Qantas' 707 heyday, there were three different RTW routes. The main one converged on NY from two different directions, one flight crossed the Pacific via Auckland, S Pacific, Hawaii, LA (&/or SF), then a US transcon to JFK. The other route was via Darwin, SE Asia, India, M East, across Europe (with, depending on the day, stops at Belgrade, Geneva and others long gone from the QF route map), Frankfurt, Heathrow then across the Atlantic to JFK. There was a third route across Central America to Heathrow, which took in Acapulco, Mexico City, Nassau and Bermuda (honestly).
Hope that's interesting (and if there's any subject that's going to bring J Travolta out of the woodwork, it's this), wondering if anyone has any further details about QF's RTW routings, and the JFK operation.
fly Saha Air 707s daily from Tehran's downtown Mehrabad to Mashhad, Kish Island and Ahwaz
Airplanetire From United States of America, joined May 2001, 1809 posts, RR: 3 Reply 1, posted (10 years 11 months 1 week 1 day 21 hours ago) and read 1897 times:
Interesting information. Does QF still fly to JFK? Also, I knew that they had did done this, but why did they fly to Belgrade?
EC-121K From , joined Dec 1969, posts, RR: Reply 4, posted (10 years 11 months 1 week 1 day 15 hours ago) and read 1801 times:
QANTAS' RTW service began on 14th January 1958, using L1049Gs. The Super Constellations flew to JFK from Sydney, via Fiji, Honolulu and San Francisco. By this time the wing tip tanks had been installed on the L1049s, and Canton Island was no longer used as a refuelling stop as in previous years. This had taken place between Nandi and Honolulu on the Pacific service.
The RTW services were initially two a week, one from Melbourne and one from Sydney. Two other flights connected with BOAC in San Francisco, so with partner airlines, this amounted to four flights a week.
QANTAS' B707 RTW services began on 27th October 1959.
Timz From United States of America, joined Sep 1999, 6465 posts, RR: 8 Reply 5, posted (10 years 11 months 1 week 1 day 8 hours ago) and read 1722 times:
I'm guessing Qantas never had a RTW flight, if by that we mean a flight that flew all the way around the world without stopping more than a couple hours at a time. They flew Australia-London westbound, and Australia-London eastbound, but never all the way around-- right?
Cedarjet From United Kingdom, joined May 1999, 7702 posts, RR: 55 Reply 6, posted (10 years 11 months 1 week 1 day 8 hours ago) and read 1707 times:
The aircraft probably did go all the way around. Timz, you're splitting hairs. If the flight number changed somewhere, or the aircraft changed, it's a fairly small difference. I think it's fair to say Qantas had a round the world service (ditto BOAC...imagine flying on a BOAC VC10 from Honolulu to Sydney?!).
fly Saha Air 707s daily from Tehran's downtown Mehrabad to Mashhad, Kish Island and Ahwaz
Timz From United States of America, joined Sep 1999, 6465 posts, RR: 8 Reply 7, posted (10 years 11 months 1 week 1 day 7 hours ago) and read 1699 times:
Qantas had round the world service-- but by my definition they never (AFAIK) had a RTW service. Can anyone find a timetable with an all-the-way-round Qantas flight?
Britair From United Kingdom, joined Aug 1999, 933 posts, RR: 17 Reply 9, posted (10 years 11 months 1 week 1 day 4 hours ago) and read 1668 times:
Belgrade was indeed a destination in its own right, and was very popular, but like Athens, Amsterdam and Manchester was dropped in the late 80's due to low yield (no business traffic, all VFR - visiting friends & relatives)
David_itl From United Kingdom, joined Jun 2001, 7143 posts, RR: 14 Reply 10, posted (10 years 11 months 1 week 1 day 1 hour ago) and read 1635 times:
Britair, your airline has caused many a foreign airline to "tactically" withdraw MAN services as your airline prefers carting passengers (especially the premium payers) down to LHR. Care to remember the QF service here...what was it, tell QF to park the 747 at LHR all day, BA would fly the pax down on a "dedicated" feeder flight, and then withdrew the service as it was taking traffic away from the shuttle service. Yes, BA - London's favourite airline.
Incidentally, QF's lounge at MAN was voted their best in the world in 1994 by the very businessmen/frequent flyers that allegedly never came here.
Mirrodie From United States of America, joined Apr 2000, 7419 posts, RR: 65 Reply 12, posted (10 years 11 months 1 week 22 hours ago) and read 1597 times:
I was on QF 108 ( a year ago on 6/25), coming into JFK. What/to where does it leave JFK for?
PS That 727 shot got cut off at the end. Bummer.
Forum moderator 2001-2010; He's a pedantic, pontificating, pretentious bastard, a belligerent old fart, a worthless st
Dynkrisolo From United States of America, joined Feb 2001, 1834 posts, RR: 7 Reply 15, posted (10 years 11 months 1 week 14 hours ago) and read 1530 times:
I am pretty certain that Qantas did have a RTW flight. Unfortunately, I don't remember the exact routing. All I know is it went through Mexico City. In fact, that was the only true RTW flight because it crossed both hemispheres.
Notdownnlocked From United States of America, joined Sep 2000, 915 posts, RR: 1 Reply 16, posted (10 years 11 months 1 week 7 hours ago) and read 1481 times:
From the QF 3/31/67 schedule that also states on the cover "Australia's Round-The-World Airline" the flights from JFK went to SFO and also to LHR 3x weekly. There is also no mention of Belgrade in this schedule so perhaps it's in another but I didn't look. Their most interesting route was the Fiesta Route SYD-NAN-PPT-ACA-MEX-NAS-BDA-LHR 1x weekly and SYD-AKL-PPT-ACA-MEX 1x weekly also.
Dutchjet From Netherlands, joined Oct 2000, 7864 posts, RR: 58 Reply 17, posted (10 years 11 months 1 week 5 hours ago) and read 1462 times:
I remember, as a child, that QF flew the "very usuaual and very exotic" FIESTA Route with all of the stops mentioned above.......really an amazing routing, something that you no longer see in today's world of hubs and alliances; these exotic routes were flown with the 707s.
QF did fly to both SFO and LAX for the longest time, I believe that the SFO service was terminated during the time that BA took an ownership interest in QF; at the time BA also owned a piece of US Air. The idea was that US Air could fly the SFO originating pax down from SFO to LAX on a dedicated feeder flight (much like the MAN-LHR scheme mentioned above) and then join the Australia bound flights. When US and BA broke up, and US pulled out of the West Coast markets, this system came to an end and SFO was quietly dropped from the QF route system.
While it is unlikely we will ever see the FIESTA Route return, QF could certainly reopen SFO as a gateway with a daily service to SYD, and it is likely that MAN could support a 3 times per week service MAN-SIN or BKK-SYD; in my personal opinion, airlines are getting a bit to focused on hubs and I think that pax would support new direct services. I am sure that everyone in MAN is tired of connecting in LHR to go just about anywhere, for example.
Cedarjet From United Kingdom, joined May 1999, 7702 posts, RR: 55 Reply 18, posted (10 years 11 months 1 week 2 hours ago) and read 1466 times:
Interesting points Dutchjet, I bet populations in the likes of Manchester (and in the case of flights to Aus, AMS, ATH, Belgrade as well) would like more direct services but unfortunately these decisions are made by beancounters and unless the passengers from these regions count a fair proportion of high-yield business travellers in their midst, they're not going to get the services. Anyway the hubs offer more variety nowadays anyway, since passengers from Manchester have plenty of one- or two-stop ways of getting to Aus: Malaysia, Emirates, SQ, Cathay, Olympic... From Amsterdam: EK, SQ, CX, OA, MH, TG, UA... Even Helsinki is joined to SYD with one stop (Thai via BKK).
fly Saha Air 707s daily from Tehran's downtown Mehrabad to Mashhad, Kish Island and Ahwaz
ETA Unknown From Comoros, joined Jun 2001, 2009 posts, RR: 0 Reply 19, posted (10 years 11 months 1 week 1 hour ago) and read 1434 times:
As a child, I flew BOAC and Qantas from JFK to SYD frequently.
QF 747's never operated this flight- always the 707's as QF withdrew from JFK around the same time their first 747's were being delivered. Both airlines used the same flight numbers for the LHR-JFK-SFO-HNL-NAN-SYD route: 531 to SYD, 530 to LHR. Both airline services were dropped at QF's request as the loads were quite dismal, especially on their JFK-LHR sector.
Due to curfew restrictions at JFK, on the SYD-LHR service, pax were accommodated at a SFO airport hotel for 6 hours to wait it out until the flight could leave SFO for JFK.
However, my best journey involved a BOAC breakdown in HNL on return to JFK. As the flight was operated by a RR powered 707, there were no spares and the replacement part had to be flown in from LHR... therefore, all pax were put up at the Outrigger Waikiki for 3 days until the aircraft was serviceable!
On another note, QF service to LAX didn't start until about 1979 using 3x weekly 747 combis LAX-HNL-SYD.
Timz From United States of America, joined Sep 1999, 6465 posts, RR: 8 Reply 20, posted (10 years 11 months 6 days ago) and read 1394 times:
8/68 OAG shows QF 530 arriving SFO 1845; arrival in JFK was 0800 so they must have spent 5+ hours in SFO. First class and coach went to the hotel?
I guess this wasn't a curfew for noise, was it? Maybe the customs inspection in JFK shut down after midnight? Pan Am's DC-8 from Dakar arrived JFK at 0415, but maybe they had their own customs crew in their terminal.
In 4/74 QF 580 left Sydney at 0945 Thu and Sun; stop for
45 min at NAN
60 min PPT
60 min ACA
60 min MEX
45 min NAS
45 min BDA
and arrive LHR 1055 Monday (the Thu departure only went as far as MEX). No indication that this was a RTW flight.
How many crew changes on this flight? Did a crew sit in ACA or NAS for days waiting for their flight back?
ETA Unknown From Comoros, joined Jun 2001, 2009 posts, RR: 0 Reply 21, posted (10 years 11 months 5 days ago) and read 1368 times:
Correct- all pax were sent to a SFO Airport Hotel for the JFK curfew. I know everyone hated it- not enough time to go to sleep.
I'm pretty sure these flights arrived at the International Arrivals Building... the BOAC-Air Canada Terminal opened in 1972 (I think) so some of these flights may have arrived/departed from there once this facility opened.
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