Usage of 747 for short routes. Economical?

Captain · Post by **Captain** » 16 Jun 2005, 17:05

I read this article from April "Iberia this week daily 1000 extra seats to Rome" https://www.aviation24.be/article8297.html on Luchtzak that Iberia is this week is using a 404 seat 747 to fly to Rome. Is it really that economical to use a long-haul aircraft for flightime of 2 hours or less? It's understandable that due to the Pope's death there was a lot of demand to get to Rome.

I understand you can fit in a lot of people in a 747 instead of using 3 or 4 Airbus A319/320 or 737's and that's less planes to use for the airline. However, in terms of fuel costs, maintenance, time to embark /disembark is this really a good decision for short flights?

I also read on Luchtzak 6months back or so that EasyJet were considering leasing an old 747 to serve popular routes during the summer but it seems that they have decided against this. Someone told me that Japan's major airlines often used 747's for internal flights during the 80's and 90's. Is this still the case today or are they shifting more towards the latest trend in the US to used 737's and the likes for long internal flights instead of wide-bodies and 747's?

sab319 · Post by **sab319** » 16 Jun 2005, 17:21

I know ANA and JAL flie the B747-400D, a special domestic veriosn of the 744 without winglets etc., on inner-japanese routes. A lot of middle-eastern carriers operate A330's and B777's on local flights too...

Buzz · Post by **Buzz** » 16 Jun 2005, 17:48

The easyJet B747 was an april fools day-joke...

If you can fill it at profitable prices, it's good to use the B747.
If you can't, then don't...
It's as simple as that.

Iberia didn't had 4-5 a320 planes available (logically) so they used a 747 they did had available.

The Japan-situation has to do with slot-restricted airports.

Gate-A1 · Post by **Gate-A1** » 26 Jun 2005, 18:51

Corsair will ban the 737 of his fleet and use A330 and 747 on routes to Cairo, Marakech Fes and Agadir.

no news of what will be do with the 737 crew

HorsePower · Post by **HorsePower** » 26 Jun 2005, 19:51

Perhaps they are looking for more A332? Air Caraïbes is going to get ride theirs 2 ones and replace them with A333.

Seb.

Humberside · Post by **Humberside** » 26 Jun 2005, 21:49

Iberia regularly use Air Atlanta 747's on MAD-TFS and maybe also LPA

MrAirbus · Post by **MrAirbus** » 26 Jun 2005, 23:20

This is a very interesting discussion!

There are some few factors that can make a short B747 flight very profitable/lucrative indeed for some airline but many factors can also make such flights uneconomical!

In Japan, JAL/ANA B747 domestic flights has got to do with the fact that there are few other forms of transportation and that they might have monopoly on certain flights. So filling a B747 is easy and good for business and maybe the passengers(?)!

Other airlines might be able to fill a B747 on a morning flight but have to fly it back empty so they might as well fly a smaller aircraft!

Loadfactor will be a hard task to maintain high with Jumbo flights! Airlines want to show there stock owners high Load factor!

Well that’s all I have to say!

lastrow · Post by **lastrow** » 27 Jun 2005, 00:51

I have been on a flight operated by KL from Fukuoka (Japan) to Pusan (South-Korea) - which was 45mins long and if I remember right, the captain was telling us that he went only up to 12000fts.

Interesting thing that it was a A332 where only each 3rd or 4th seat was taken. This flight was a normally scheduled one (I think for each weekday). I had the impression that this one was to get the A332 back to Pusan where some of them were alredy standing around. I do not know what other sense this one would make: an afternoon flight from Fukuoka to Pusan for 45minsi on a A332 ... Altough the A332 is known to be a very efficient aircraft, it seems to be some Asian-specific issue to schedule this one for a flight this short. I loved it because it was the first A332 experience for me

-lr.

PS. departing in Fukouka:

earthman · Post by **earthman** » 27 Jun 2005, 01:39

Yes perhaps they had to fly the plane there anyway, and it is not normally used on the route. Or there was a technical difficulty with the normal aircraft and they had this one standing around doing nothing anyway.

Also seeing how it takes about half an hour to get down from cruising altitude to landing, and about the same amount of time from take-off to cruise, it's not surprising that the aircraft didn't go beyond 12000ft.

yagoceron · Post by **yagoceron** » 11 Jul 2005, 22:49

Yes Iberia regularly uses 747 for the Canary islands.

And I also read somewhere that the 644 pax version of Emirates A380 is for regional flights.

EBAW_flyer · Post by **EBAW_flyer** » 12 Jul 2005, 09:56

It's simple: the cost of 1 747 is less than 2-3 A320's. Doesn't that seems logical? Less fuel burn, less airport charges, ... . That's the reason why for example Air Algerie sometimes uses the 767 iso 2 737's, RAM the 747 (480pax) iso 3 737's (500 pax). More economical to use 1 aircraft than to use 3 or 4.

L-1011 · Post by **L-1011** » 12 Jul 2005, 10:17

HorsePower wrote:Perhaps they are looking for more A332? Air Caraïbes is going to get ride theirs 2 ones and replace them with A333.

fftopic:
I know this is off-topic, but might one of those be the future 4th SN 330 ?

Allnipponairways · Post by **Allnipponairways** » 13 Jul 2005, 03:16

Its true , ANA and JAL are using 747 to do their domestic flights here, not all day long but only in really busy day times like 2 flights in morning and 3 in the evening and during the day they can still fill up a 767 ... so they use full economy onthe 747 ... all the time ,it is outragesly big inside and allows a lot of passengers on board ... the crew must be very addapted to these kind of working conditions, they get Drink on boord from TOKYO TO OSAKA and FROM TOKYO TO ... all over japan ...
greets

hvv · Post by **hvv** » 18 Jul 2005, 14:20

Japan uses B747 domestically, as already stated above, and they get pretty full. On the Osaka-Tokyo stretch, the Shinkansen high-speed trains would have to be the main competition, but they are price-wise comparable to flights, and time-wise there isn't much difference either, once you take into account the time to get to and from the airport, check-in etc.

Outside of Japan, I've also had intra-India flights on B747 (Air India).

Lufthansa uses A300-600 from Frankfurt to Berlin and back. Apparently, parking those big planes in Berlin is a major cost saving compared to Frankfurt, which is one of the reasons for doing it! Between Frankfurt and London Heathrow they also use these planes occasionally, but then they tend to be pretty full.

In the past, I've also had B747 flights for short hops (for example, Paris to Amsterdam), but that was invariably an extension to a main intercontinental flight. Singapore Airlines did that: from SIN to CDG or ZRH, and then continue to BRU or AMS. I'm not sure if they still do.

BR

Hans.

TCAS_climb · Post by **TCAS_climb** » 18 Jul 2005, 15:28

Flying short-haul with long-haul airplanes that were not designed for that puts a lot of stress on them. Not a good idea IMHO.

Wonder if those Domestic 747 have stronger structure or landing gears.

EBAW_flyer · Post by **EBAW_flyer** » 19 Jul 2005, 00:15

Wonder if those Domestic 747 have stronger structure or landing gears

They have.

Buzz · Post by **Buzz** » 19 Jul 2005, 00:52

The 747's in Japan are 747D's (domestic?), wich mean the don't have winglets, and have a stronger body & landinggear, to cope with the increased landings and take-offs.

The IBERIA situation is, as I stated above, not a matter of economics or longhaul/shorthaul... They wanted the extra capacity right away, so they had to use the equipment they've got. IBERIA might have one A320 on standby, but not 4-5. They did have a 747 who could squeeze a 4 hour rotation to Rome into it's schedule...

jfaltena · Post by **jfaltena** » 19 Jul 2005, 01:11

hvv wrote:In the past, I've also had B747 flights for short hops (for example, Paris to Amsterdam), but that was invariably an extension to a main intercontinental flight. Singapore Airlines did that: from SIN to CDG or ZRH, and then continue to BRU or AMS. I'm not sure if they still do.

Nope, SQ doesn't anymore since they've skipped AMS out of the B747 SIN-AMS-JFK route and went direct to SIN-JFK with A 340-500 material in an 18 (?) hour flight... They've opened a non-stop B777 link between SIN and AMS instead...

Grtz, John

hvv · Post by **hvv** » 19 Jul 2005, 13:33

The SQ flights I was talking about actually finished in Brussels or Amsterdam, after a stop in Zurich or Paris, they were not the SIN-JFK flights with stop in AMS. Anyway, JFK-AMS is long-distance enough that it wouldn't be topic of discussion in this particular thread

Regarding that direct SIN-JFK flight, 18 hours on a plane sounds rather terrible (in an economy seat - or are they all business class seats?)...

Hans.