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Qantas Group CEO Vanessa Hudson confirmed the A220 delivery schedule, remarking last week that “by Christmas, our first Airbus A220 will arrive for QantasLink.”
And while Hudson praised the Airbus A220’s domestic potential as “an aircraft with the ability to fly between any two ports in Australia, burn up to 20% less fuel and make 50% less noise”, it’s also set to embark on short-range international flights, where the efficiently nimble jet has the potential to open up new routes.
Qantas has already earmarked the first Airbus A220 flights between Canberra and Melbourne for early 2024, after it undergoes regulatory approvals, airport readiness and training activities, with other regional and primary domestic routes soon to follow as more new jets arrive.
The A220 will quickly replace the Boeing 717 as QantasLink’s trusty workhorse, with the final 717 being flown out of Sydney in July 2024.
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| QANTASLINK BOEING 717-23S VH-NXD (MSN 55062) |
Seven A220s are expected to be flying by the end of 2024, and they’ll be supplemented by QantasLink E190s leased from Alliance Airlines, with all 29 A220s sitting in the Qantas hangars by 2027.
Praising the A220 as “a game changer,” outgoing QantasLink CEO John Gissing previously enthused to Executive Traveller “it’s got new technology with a super-quiet cabin (and) it’s got twice the range of the 717.”
That extended range will see the A220 flying not only regional and inter-city domestic routes – connecting smaller capitals like Canberra and Hobart with Qantas hubs at Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane – but also taking on international routes to South-East Asia as more aircraft enter the fleet, Gissing said.
The first QantasLink A220 aircraft should soon be ready for test flights at the Airbus production facility in Mirabel, Canada (where the A220 began life as the Bombardier CSeries, before Airbus took a majority stake in the aircraft program). And there’s no doubt that for a little plane, the nimble Airbus A220 is going to have an outsize impact on Qantas and travellers.
Alongside the Airbus A321XLR, the Qantas A220 is part of a sweeping multi-billion-dollar renewal of Qantas’ domestic fleet – although both jets are also expected to fly short-range international routes to New Zealand and Asia.
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Praising the A220 as “a game changer,” outgoing QantasLink CEO John Gissing previously enthused to Executive Traveller “it’s got new technology with a super-quiet cabin (and) it’s got twice the range of the 717.”
That extended range will see the A220 flying not only regional and inter-city domestic routes – connecting smaller capitals like Canberra and Hobart with Qantas hubs at Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane – but also taking on international routes to South-East Asia as more aircraft enter the fleet, Gissing said.
The first QantasLink A220 aircraft should soon be ready for test flights at the Airbus production facility in Mirabel, Canada (where the A220 began life as the Bombardier CSeries, before Airbus took a majority stake in the aircraft program). And there’s no doubt that for a little plane, the nimble Airbus A220 is going to have an outsize impact on Qantas and travellers.
Alongside the Airbus A321XLR, the Qantas A220 is part of a sweeping multi-billion-dollar renewal of Qantas’ domestic fleet – although both jets are also expected to fly short-range international routes to New Zealand and Asia.
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