Qantas's first Project Sunrise test flight has arrived in Sydney, the nonstop Boeing 787-9 touching down on runway 16R some 19h 16min after becoming airborne from New York JFK. Project Sunrise is the airline's initiative to open nonstop services to the Australian east coast from New York and London from around 2022-23. Although these services will use either Airbus A350 or Boeing 777X jets, three Qantas 787 delivery flights will be used during the fourth quarter of this year to gather data on ultra-long-haul services for the carrier. The first of these 787s – a General Electric GEnx-powered twinjet, VH-ZHI – took off from JFK's runway 31L shortly before 21:30 on 18 October. Designated as flight QF7879 the aircraft transported just 49 passengers and crew, and no cargo, in order to give it the necessary range. It carried a maximum fuel load of 101t and Qantas expected the aircraft to land with 6t on board. It landed with a "comfortable" 70min of fuel remaining, according to the aircraft's captain, Sean Golding. The airline says it departed at 233t. The jet had been delivered from Boeing's Seattle facility and transferred to Los Angeles before flying to New York ahead of the Project Sunrise test. It departed JFK about 3h behind the regular QF12 service which operates to Sydney via Los Angeles – a 787 conducting the first sector before an Airbus A380 picks up the transpacific leg. The QF12 flight arrived in Los Angeles while the Project Sunrise aircraft was still in the vicinity of Missouri. But the connection time meant that, by the time the A380 took off for Sydney, it had been caught by the nonstop 787 which effectively shadowed it across the ocean.

Source: FlightGlobal

Hong Kong’s widespread anti-government protests are taking a “significant” and “unprecedented” toll on the city’s aviation sector that has led IATA to urge its authorities to provide financial relief for the sector. In its latest research, the trade body raised the red flag on the ongoing unrest, which is well into its fourth month, saying that it has had “significant impact on air passenger traffic flows in one of the region’s main airline hubs”. In terms of year-on-year growth, passenger departures from Hong Kong saw a drop of more than 15% in August, which IATA says is a “steep decline that is almost unprecedented for major markets”. Airlines’ scheduled seats are also showing a downward trend in the later months of the year, though IATA says that the size of reduction indicates “the downturn is expected to be of a temporary nature”.

Source: FlightGlobal

Iraqi Airways is inviting bids from European operators to conduct services on its behalf to European destinations. The Baghdad-based flag carrier says it is looking for wet-lease offers, or "viable" alternative proposals, to serve a schedule to European cities under its traffic rights. Iraqi Airways is prohibited from operating within European Union airspace, having been individually blacklisted four years ago. The airline says any candidates must be European-registered and hold a valid European air operator's certificate. "Applications shall only be entertained from airlines operating the most modern aircraft fleets," it states, indicating that the average fleet age should not exceed six years. Aircraft should also have a two-class configuration including a business-class cabin. There must also be "reasonable" time intervals remaining before major maintenance checks, the carrier adds, while training should be provided to qualify Iraqi Airways crews to European Union Aviation Safety Agency standards.

Source: FlightGlobal