FLUG REVUE April 2004: A340-500 flies super-long routes

SIA: THE LONGEST SCHEDULED FLIGHT IN THE WORLD

By Andreas Spaeth

For the first time since the late 1980s, the world is getting smaller. Back then, the advent of the 747-400 meant that routes such as London-Singapore and Los Angeles-Sydney could be flown non-stop. Since then, the upper limit on the length of a scheduled flight has been around 14 hours. Lufthansa's longest scheduled flight is currently its Frankfurt-Buenos Aires connection in 13 hours and 45 minutes (on which the A340-600 was recently introduced), Air New Zealand operates a 14 hour 747-400 service from Los Angeles to Auckland, and Continental Airlines flies from New York Newark to Hong Kong with the Boeing 777-200ER, also in 14 hours.

Thanks to the new A340-500 ultra-long-range airliner from Airbus, which has a range of up to 15,800km, destinations are moving closer. Up to now, the best long-haul jets from Airbus and Boeing, when fully laden, have had a maximum range of 14,800km (A340-200) and 14,300km (777-200ER) respectively. But more and more airlines rely for their business on time-pressed business travellers who want to get to their destination as quickly as possible and cut out any time-consuming intermediate stops.

At the beginning of December 2003, Dubai-based Emirates introduced a new non-stop 14 hour service from its home base on the Persian Gulf to Sydney, using its first A340-500's, and from the second half of 2004 it will also be flying non-stop to New York from the Persian Gulf.

But the new offering launched by Singapore Airlines (SIA) on 3 February 2004 represents a real quantum leap. On that day, one of the three first out of five A340-500's on order took off on the first scheduled non-stop flight SQ20 from Singapore to Los Angeles. The 14,762km route eastwards to America, flown almost entirely above the Pacific, takes 16 hours, while the return flight to Asia against unfavourable winds is scheduled to take 18 hours and 20 minutes. This represents a time saving of between one-and-a-half and two hours compared with the daily services via Taipei or Tokyo, which will continue to be offered.

Not content with this, from August 2004 the airline will be offering a further attraction: non-stop services from Singapore to New York and back again. The outward flight will follow a 15,700km route along the Pacific coast and over northern Canada, while the return flight above the North Pole will be significantly longer, at 16,600km. Due to the prevailing wind directions, both flights will take about 18 hours. Up to now, SIA's New York services have had a refuelling stop in Frankfurt or Amsterdam. The new direct route across the Pacific or the North Pole will reduce the trip time from America to Asia by two hours, and from Singapore to New York by as much as 6 hours.

Flights of this length require a rethink as regards the cabin configuration. It is no longer a question of installing as many seats as possible, but of offering customers an environment in which an 18-hour long flight can be endured. Here Singapore Airlines has arrived at what may well prove a groundbreaking solution: it is marketing these flights as an upgraded premium product for Business Class and Economy Class, at the cost of dispensing with First Class.

Compared with the daily services still on offer that do have an intermediate stop, passengers will pay a surcharge of about ten percent on the ticket price, which to date has typically been about Euro 900 for a return flight in Economy Class and Euro 4,000 in Business Class. For the extra cost, passengers will gain not only extra time but significantly greater onboard comfort.

The aircraft have only 64 seats in the “Raffles Business Class” and 117 places in the Tourist Class, known as “Executive Economy”. “We decided to have only one premium class, because our First Suites take up the same space as two-and-a-quarter Business Class seats,” explains SIA product manager Shirlene Teo. Airbus envisages 313 passengers in a three-class configuration, but Singapore Airlines is actually only installing 181 seats.

In the rear cabin, the result is a comfortable 2-3-2 row layout configuration, rather than the normal 2-4-2 seating arrangement. The 93cm seat pitch is the most generous of any Economy cabin in the world. The seat backs can be inclined backwards by 20cm and are fitted with leg- and footrests which are actually true to their names. The generous area devoted to a bar in the rear section of the aircraft will be especially welcome to passengers, who will be invited with snacks and drinks to get up and stretch their legs. Whether the latest US security regulations against people gathering in groups in the aircraft will bring access restrictions in the future is not yet clear.

The Business cabin, which occupies over half of the entire cabin floorspace, boasts a reclining seat, known as “Space Bed”, which is 15cm longer than the SIA standard product. With a 1.62m gap between seats, it will be even more comfortable, and once again a bar will be available for passengers. An in-flight entertainment system with 200 channels will offer films, CDs and games to suit every taste.

Meanwhile, Emirates from Dubai is providing as many as 500 channels and is offering the world premiere of a spectacular First Class cabin which is causing a sensation in the industry. Twelve passengers on board the A340-500 enjoy the privilege of travelling in the first private suite of any commercial airline, and of sleeping in a seat which can not only be turned into a flatbed but also boasts refinements such as a built-in minibar. Two sliding doors form a shoulder-height partition, when required, which makes a kind of small room, thus offering a degree of privacy that must be unique in the world of scheduled flights.

Despite the cocoon-like bedhead, the 42 Business Class seats have a more conventional appearance and do not offer the slightly inclined sleep area that is customary elsewhere. The seat pitch of 1.39m is somewhat stingy and is convincingly surpassed, for instance, by the new Lufthansa Business Class seats, which have a seat pitch of 1.50m. Again, bearing in mind the long flight times, there is nothing new in the Economy cabin apart from 2.5cm of extra seat pitch and slightly more room to manoeuvre the backrest. With a total of 258 seats on board, Emirates evidently could not bring itself to break with tradition in its cabin product, except in its spectacular First Class section.

However, the Arabs take pride in a second world premiere on their A340-500's: an automatic “mood lighting” system changes the cabin lighting in tune with the time of day at the destination, and at night the starry sky above Dubai is projected onto the cabin ceiling, complete with twinkling stars. The aim of this light show is to adapt the body to the new time zone more effectively and reduce jetlag.

The extremely long flights are also a challenge from an operational point of view: they are flown with two complete crews, who at Emirates swap places halfway through the flight after seven hours. Pilots' rest periods are spent in comfortable individual cabins behind the cockpit, where they enjoy not only a proper bed but also a comfortable seat. These cabins are shielded against cabin noise and the humidity is individually adjustable. Cabin crew are accommodated in a crew rest room fitted with up to eight bunk beds in the lower deck, which is accessed through the onboard kitchen located in the underfloor area.

Airbus stresses the reliability of its four-engined aircraft on flights of this length, during which for much of the time they are a long way away from any diversion airfield. As marketing employee Xavier Burgat points out, “If one of the four engines has to be shut down, there is no need to land the aircraft early.” This compares favourably with twin-engined aircraft, which have to be specifically certificated under the ETOPS regulations if they are to fly out of range of a diversion airfield for extended periods. Thus it seems that nothing lies in the way of further ultra-long routes. “With the A340-500, we intend to supersede services which hitherto have involved a stopover, and we are planning to introduce non-stop services to San Francisco and Chicago,” explains Shirlene Teo. These planes open up the possibility of flying direct from Europe to Australia for the first time. However, none of the present A340-500 customers, which also include Thai Airways and Air Canada, has announced any plans for this as yet.

From FLUG REVUE 4/2004, page 22

Last updated 12 March 2004

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