Qantas just made a test flight from JFK to Sydney.



Because the 787-9 can't do it fully loaded, the test flight had 50 passengers (Qantas staff). I hope that some of them were crammed into economy seats, unless Qantas plans to fit out an aircraft with business/premium economy only (which I think they should if they want to do NY-SYD and LON-SYD). The aircraft they are considering for the flights are the A350 and B777, but I think it's likely to be the A350. They appear to be moving to Airbus for most of their future aircraft.

PS Naming the flight QF7879 was amusing. Normally the longer numbers are used for domestic flights.
PPS I just found out that all the passengers used Business class. :P

Yes, I could handle such a flight in business, but down the back in cattle class, hmmmm.

They also had the pilots wired up with all sorts of medical monitoring equipment to assess alertness, fatigue etc as bringing this flight to commercial reality also requires a relaxation of maximum duty time.

I believe that they had six pilots on board? But yes, pilot's union rules are an issue to be overcome. Plus having a plane capable of making the flight commercially viable. I just hope it's two classes - business and premium economy.

That's a really long flight over the ocean! It would be very difficult to imagine that 2 engined aircraft would be capable and allowed to take such a long flight a few years ago!!!

True! Possible diversions to Hawaii, Kiribati, Fiji, Samoa, New Caledonia and Brisbane, but a heck of a lot of nothing in between.