Calling it a night

Design philosophy

At first glance the 767’s 48m wing span was attention grabbing.

It’s huge 283m2 area and high aspect ratio was Boeing’s secret to success: it gave the aircraft room to grow, the ability to cruisehigh – thanks to one of the best distributions of lift ever achieved on a Boeing aircraft – and more fuel capability translating to a range of over 5,000nm.

Airbus’s competing A300 had the capability to efficiently operate across the Tasman, but its short range was of little use to the rest of the Qantas network, while the smaller A310’s cargo capacity was limited.

Born was the aircraft Qantas had been looking for.

The association with the 767 began in September 1983 when an initial order was placed for six 767-200ERs powered by Pratt & Whitney JT9D turbofans.

The first twin-engined aircraft to be operated by Qantas since the DC-3 three decades earlier, it opened a myriad of commercial opportunities that the all-747 fleet just didn’t allow.

With a seat cost similar to the 747 at half the capacity, Qantas was able to increase frequency to New Zealand and Singapore, and open new direct routes to Nagoya, Osaka and Tokyo.

Three’s a crowd

“Two-man crewed twin-jets are certainly no less safe than three-man crewed aircraft. ” A review of the new 767 by then Australian Aviation editor Jim Thorn in 1985 proclaimed the wonders of “the incredible array of computers and flight management systems. . . that can coordinate each flight from takeoff to landing… with flight data and other sensor information presented in colour on television-like displays. ” The 767’s cockpit was a technological revolution: EFIS, EICAS, and ACARS replacedanalogue. And at least for all airlines except Ansett, the flight engineer. It was a standard two-crew operation, validated as safe by the US Presidential Task Force review of two-crew operations. But Ansett, through fear of industrial action by the Australian Airline Flight Engineers Association (AAFEA), specified a cockpit modification to incorporate a flight engineer station. Those five Ansett 767-200s were unique in the world of 767-200 operators. Fuelled by fear over continued future employment of flight engineers, the AAFEA ran a similar, sophisticated industrial campaign at Qantas to incorporate a flight engineer station. The AAFEA made assertions that the addition of a flight engineer actually reduced cost – “it could be proven that the cost of providing the FEO would be saved as a result of their presence on board”.

An independent audit of all financial costing for the operationin relation to FEO deployment on Qantas 767 aircraft proved in Qantas’s favour. The AAFEA continued its campaign, but by the time of Qantas service, the 767 had more than two years of safe two-crew operations. The Australian International Pilot’s Association, Boeing – which had refused to rewrite procedures for three-crew operation – the FAA, Australia’s CAA and European airworthiness authorities all endorsed two-crew operations.

Qantas was steadfast, and eventually won an amicable peace.

Into service Qantas’s first 767-238ER, VH-EAJ City of Wollongong, was delivered in July 1985 routing from Seattle via San Francisco-Los Angeles-Honolulu-Nadi-Sydney.

All six of the original order arrived by March of 1986, deployed on medium and long-haul international routes shortly thereafter. Reflects former Qantas Captain Bill Anderson, “the 767-200 was a good aircraft to fly, but was a demanding aircraft to fly asymmetrically when training in 35kt crosswind conditions. Simulators at the time didn’t accurately fully reflect asymmetric handling. ” Qantas’s dispatch reliability assisted in the extension of 120-minute EROPS to 138 minutes. From the outset, “Qantas operated extended-range twins much more consistently than most areas of the world,” said Alan Terrell, general manager operations at the time. “We took the commercial decision to operate long-range twins where Lufthansa, for example, has not. ” Still insufficient, what Qantas required was 180-minute clearance to be able to launch operations to Hawaii and the continental US. The new Pratt & Whitney JT9Ds were not meeting fuel burn expectations, and were behind on EROPS certification.

Advantage 767-300ER

So in 1987 when a firm order was placed for a single 767-300ER plus four options, P&W was ditched for General Electric’s new CF6-80C2, the new turbofan offering full 180-minute EROPS clearance from certification. The CF6’s modular design offered maintenance efficiencies and fuel burn was best in its class for medium to long-haul sectors.

The first 767-338ER, VH-OGA City of Whyalla, touched down in Sydney on September 1 1988.

No other type came close to matching the 767-300ER’s performance: lightly loaded it could climb to FL360 in a little over 10 minutes.

For crew the -300ER was “all about power – with an exceptional power-to-weight ratio. It was high performance and easy to handle,” says Anderson. He recalls a still winter morning in Adelaide: “It was magnificent, a no de-rated thrust takeoff, the climb was steep and fast, you could feel yourself being pushed into your seat – it was fun. ” Former first officer Brett Trouville has similar memories: “It could be a handful if you weren’t prepared, you always had to be a minute ahead of it. ” But he says, handling it was a delight: “In crosswind it would just sit there. Disconnect the autopilot and auto-throttle it was a just like a big Cessna that would do exactly what you would say. ” For commercial planning the 767-300ER allowed Qantas a further revision of its network strategy. Honolulu and Singapore became offshore hubs.

From Singapore the ‘Rice Bowl’ intra-Asian network connected Bangkok, Jakarta, Singapore and Hong Kong to carry Australian tourists on an Asian circuit. Seoul flights were launched. VH-OGA was rebranded in ‘Australia Asia Airlines’ livery, allowing thelaunch of services to Taipei – circumventing Chinese restrictions precluding Qantas as the flag carrier from serving both the Chinese mainland and Taiwan.

Honolulu became a staging point for services to Los Angeles, Papeete, San Francisco, Toronto and Vancouver.

The -300ER fleet grew to 22 GE-powered aircraft, later joined in the early 2000s by another seven Rolls-Royce RB211-powered aircraft acquired from British Airways – nicknamed ‘the Rattlers’.

From the outset the RR-powered sub-fleet was relegated to domestic operations. Heavier than a CF6, Rolls Royce’s three-spool RB211-524H engine was more robust and suited to the hammering of high-cycle domestic Australian flying.

Replacing the irreplaceable

An oxymoron perhaps, but the Qantas 767 fleet built itself into a valuable niche role. It was popular with passengers who got their preferred choice of seat – 87 per cent of seats on the aircraft are either an aisle or a window seat – and it’s configuration meant it could be turned for a domestic sector in 40 minutes.

It resisted the strain of a high-cycle environment well, says Trouville. “The 767 handles the punishment of a high-cycle environment really well. Domestically you can take it up and down four cycles in a row, there’s equipment constantly touching it, and it continues to perform. Even though it was designed as a long-haul aircraft, it’s flexible. ” A 767 replacement was first mooted in 2000 when Qantas chose the A330 ahead of the 767-400. The -400 was perfectly suited for domestic flights – closely matched in size and weight to Qantas’s A330-200s – but it didn’t offer true long-range capability, and had no scope for further size growth.

The first A330-200s arrived in November 2002, deployeddomestically on Cityflyer services. In service it quickly became apparent that the A330’s long turn times versus the 767 made them less effective on high-cycle routes.

Gradually over the last decade the 767’s international operations decreased as the growing A330 fleet picked up the load. The change reinforced the versatility of the aircraft as it was slowly switched to domestic and regional international flying. Between 2003 and 2005 the -200 series aircraft were retired, but the 767‑300ERs flew on.

In March 2006, when Qantas ordered the 787 it forecast the end of the 767 from 2008. Instead, soon would begin the Group’s well-known 787 delays. Left with a fleet hole, many of the A330s were drafted into Jetstar service to launch international operations, and the 767s were retained to fill the gap.

The 767’s operational reliability was validated in 2006 when Qantas and GE celebrated one million flight hours by the airline’s fleet of CF6-powered aircraft without an inflight engine shutdown. Qantas was recognised as the world leader with performance six times better than the world average.

“Performance was magnificent, like a Porsche with no traction control. A sports car that would just keep going all day. ”

New tricks

By 2011 the aircraft was running out of new tricks. With aviation technology developing at a rapid pace, the remaining fleet needed an avionics and cabin upgrade – a substantial capital outlay for a depreciated aircraft in the twilight of its career.

Retaining the 767 proved an important strategic tool in the fight against Virgin Australia. The aircraft gave Qantas the capability to boost peak capacity on the triangle, while allowing widebody capacity on east-west flying to be easily ramped up and down.

The 787 delays granted a service life extension to 2016, securing the decision to embark on two $15 million upgrade programs of the remaining 15 GE-powered aircraft to keep them competitive: one to equip the aircraft with ADS-B to meet CASA’s mandate – also making available RNP-AR procedures for the first time – and the other a full cabin refresh supported by a new wireless Q-streaming entertainment system.

Delayed retirement had finally caught up. The fleet’s age, high cost per available seat kilometre – driven by high fuel burn and maintenance requirements of ageing high-cycle airframes – and a need to realise the efficiencies of fleet simplification, saw the accelerated retirement of Qantas’s remaining 767-300ERs announced at full year results in August.

Age will not weary them

There’s a lot of cans to be made out of a scrapped 767, but Qantas’s engineering and operational reputation has ensured that many of the retiring 767s continue life elsewhere: 767-238ER VH-EAQ is now registered as N2767 and flies as Google’s corporate jet; most of the RR-powered fleet are undergoing freighter conversion in Shanghai; while another four -300ERs have been sold to Boeing Capital, which is understood to have sold them to Canada’s Westjet.

Goodbye

Qantas Freight will continue to operate its single 767-300F freighter, but passengers will miss flying the 767.

Courage, endurance, and ingenuity: attributes reflective of the Australian spirit, and an adept description of the Boeing 767’s tenure of service carrying the ‘Spirit of Australia’.

Vale a great aircraft.