Qantas unveils Project Sunrise details

 

Flying Sydney to London non stop. 

Not for me, thanks, but it is easy to see why Qantas' unveiling of its Project Sunrise program has created so much excitement. 

Qantas will launch its world-first non-stop services between Sydney and London from October 2027. 

The announcement came as the Australian national carrier unveiled its first Airbus A350-1000ULR in Qantas livery at Airbus’ manufacturing facility in Toulouse. 

Qantas has been flying between Sydney and London since 1947, when the original Kangaroo Route took four days with seven stops in Darwin, Singapore, Calcutta, Karachi, Cairo, Castel Benito and Rome. 

The new non-stop flights will cut up to four hours off the travel time compared to current one-stop services with a time of around 22 hours. These ultra long-haul services will operate alongside Qantas’ existing Perth-London and Sydney-Singapore-London services. 

The first Project Sunrise Sydney to London services will go on sale in February 2027, the airline says.

The A350-1000ULR has been specifically manufactured by Airbus for Project Sunrise, fitted with an additional 20,000-litre fuel tank that enables the aircraft to fly more than 16,000 kilometres, for up to 22 hours non-stop. 

Qantas will take delivery of 12 aircraft in total, each configured with 238 seats across four cabins.

Qantas Group CEO Vanessa Hudson said confirmation of the launch route marks a new dawn of travel for customers around the world.

“Qantas was built on the belief that Australia's distance from the rest of the world should never stand in the way," Hudson says. "The pioneering spirit of generations of our people has forged that path ever since, and today is the most significant step in that mission in our 105-year history.

“Since we first flew the Kangaroo Route in 1947, where we stopped seven times on the way to London, every generation of aircraft has taken a stop out of the journey. Today, we're taking out the last one."

I like a stop or two en route. A meal, maybe, a massage, even an overnight sleep. But for many speed in of the essence and this fits their needs. 

Since 2018, more than 1.7 million passengers have flown on Qantas' non-stop long-haul services from Perth to London, Rome and Paris, and its Melbourne to Dallas and Auckland to New York services.