Airbus has confirmed that its A350 jet is capable of performing the world’s longest flight.
Qantas Airways Limited, Australia’s flag airline, is looking to invest in a new jet that connects Melbourne and Sydney to London and New York. With such routes spanning over 10,000 miles, however, there are currently aren’t any jets capable of performing these ultra-long-distance flights — not without making at least one stop. But Qantas Airways Limited doesn’t want a connecting flight. It wants to perform nonstop flights between the aforementioned cities. As a result, Australia’s flag airline has asked Boeing and Airbus to develop a jet that’s capable of performing 10,000+ mile nonstop flights.
There are numerous mid-range jets that are more than capable of flying over 5,000 miles without stopping. Unfortunately, there aren’t any jets that can perform the 10,000 mile flights needed to connect Melbourne and Sydney to London and New York. Therefore, Qantas Airways Limited has asked Boeing and Airbus for help. As the world’s two leading aerospace manufacturing companies, Qantas Airways Limited believes they can either develop a new jet or modify one of their existing jets to perform such flights.
While Qantas Airways Limited hasn’t said selected a company to manufacture its long-range jet, Airbus appears to be up for the task. According to one report, Airbus says it can modify the A350 to meet Qantas Airways Limited’s demands. Specifically, Airbus claims it can modify either the A350-900 or A350-1000 to perform these super-long-distance nonstop flights. Of course, the A350-900 and A350-1000 are the two main variants of Airbus’s A350 jet. The 900 is the smaller variant of the two, with a price tag of roughly $317 million, whereas the 1000 is the larger and more expensive variant at $366 million.
The A350’s origins can be traced back to 2004, during which Airbus engineers proposed a new twin-engine wide-body jet featuring the A330’s fuselage. Since then, Airbus has delivered approximately 257 900 variants and 21 1000 variants, resulting in 278 total deliveries. In terms of sales, however, the numbers are even higher. Reports show Airbus has received 713 orders for the 900 variant and 180 orders for the 1000 variant.
Of course, Qantas Airways Limited and Airbus have a long history together. In 2015, Airbus introduced its A350 jet with the Australian airline, paving the way for sales to other airlines. Therefore, there’s a good chance Qantas Airways Limited will choose Airbus for its new ultra-long-range jet.
According to Qantas Airways Limited, Airbus and Boeing will provide proposals on developing a new ultra-long-range jet by the end of August.
