Here’s the best-case scenario as laid out in a big profile of the plane in USA Today: the Dreamliner is not only luxurious and comfy, it’s 30 per cent cheaper to operate, which will help ameliorate some of the inconveniences of flying. Flights might be cheaper. That’s a strong might, though; passing savings on to customers hasn’t exactly been an airline strong suit.
The airlines could, though, use the savings to run the 787 on long, low-demand routes — the new United Continental behemoth already plans to fly the plane from Houston to Auckland. Get enough non-stops going, and the benefits reach far beyond the Dreamliner passengers. Fewer connecting flights through congested regional hubs means fewer cascading delays and more space on the runways. That’s less time suffering in the airport, and more time doing whatever the hell else you want. Sounds great! But then you remember that these are the same people who slapped you with a bag fee, took away your pillow and your meal, and you get a little more pessimistic.
So can the Dreamliner really improve the experience of flying? It’d be hard not to, at least a little bit; for something that’s so intrinsically cool, the actual experience of zipping through the air at 9150m remains awfully crappy. And rather than rely on a fantasy of improvement by technology, I’d settle for the miracle of better service. But in the meantime–a guy can dream, can’t he?
Chris
Saturday, October 22, 2011 at 10:01 AM12 hours hey, I suggest you look at the map and see how far apart Tokyo and Hong Kong are.
Rick
Saturday, October 22, 2011 at 10:13 AMDepends on which way you fly!
Chris
Saturday, October 22, 2011 at 1:52 PMThis is true, but I see the 12 hour reference was removed. It’s about 5 hours.
Logan Booker
Saturday, October 22, 2011 at 3:04 PMI read the original article. The US author misinterpreted the story. It is indeed a 4-5 hour flight. :)
Antonia
Saturday, October 22, 2011 at 2:55 PMI regularly fly cattle class and I doubt that the Dreamliner will bring anything extra to flying (in the sense that the experience will be superior to flying a modern Airbus).
Also I doubt that I’ll ever need to fly Houston to Auckland, though Melbourne to Western Europe in one jump would be something.
Brad
Saturday, October 22, 2011 at 6:07 PMNot sure if we’ll be seeing much benefit from the Dreamliner’s range in Australia. Boeing already produces the 777-200LR which theoretically has the range to fly from Sydney to Europe/Eastern USA non-stop and has been out since ’04.
(of course this is based on “maximum range”, realistically the best you could hope for with 777-200LR is say, Perth to Europe or Auckland to Eastern USA)
So far only 52 of those have been ordered. As far as Australia’s concerned, I think the hub-and-spoke strategy of stopovers through Singapore/Los Angeles will be the status quo for a long time to come – until of course we start seeing planes with the A380′s capacity combined with 777-200LR’s range + 2500km.
Snag
Saturday, October 22, 2011 at 9:36 PMThe plane and features sound interesting, but would be creamed on long haul runs by ANY existing aircraft creatively modified to permit economy passengers to stretch out a little flatter. In the meantime, our aircraft of choice on the Sydney-Heathrow route is the A380 with Singapore Air, including a Singapore stopover (legs of 8h and 13h).
chris
Saturday, October 22, 2011 at 10:20 PMYes it all looks fine and well but its down to how the company who buys the plane decks it out.. probably all orderthe version with 3 extra rows squeezed in with minimum options so wont be much different for the passenger just better on fuel for the airline company..