Qantas has announced limited flights to Melbourne from LA and London – opening up a potentially lucrative market for expats to bring their pets back to Australia.
The Victorian capital is home to the nation’s only pet quarantine centre, with arrivals being forced to land at Melbourne Airport before their cats and dogs are taken directly to Mickleham.
Previous special Qantas and Virgin Australia flights from the US city landed at Brisbane only. While United does still fly direct from the US to Australia, their flights stop only at Sydney.
The LA to Melbourne flights are scheduled for 16, 23 and 30 May, and 6 June, while the London to Melbourne journeys will take place on 13, 15, 20, 22, 27, 29 May, and 3 and 5 June.
At the start of April, Qantas and Virgin resumed limited international flights to Australia from London, Los Angeles, Hong Kong and Auckland after agreeing to a repatriation deal with the government.
The subsidised services ran over four weeks and included freight capacity for imports and exports.
In addition, 15 airlines have signed up to utilise the new $110 million “International Freight Assistance Mechanism” government initiative, which partially underwrites cargo routes previously cut off by the coronavirus crisis.
The scheme will initially focus on key markets of China, Japan, Hong Kong and the UAE and the first airlines and freight companies to sign up are Qantas and Virgin Australia as well as Cathay Pacific, Emirates, Etihad, Federal Express, Japan Airlines, Singapore Airlines, Qatar, CT Freight, Schenker Australia, Kuehne + Nagel, Air Menzies International, Toll and DHL Global Forwarding.
Both Qantas and Virgin Australia groups suspended all regular international flights from the end of March due to the coronavirus crisis.
Craigy
says:According to the Qantas Source, Qantas A333s have been busy flying cargo flights to Shanghai, Narita, Hong Kong, and Singapore. As well the B789s have been completing repatriation flights from London, Dehli, Hong Kong, LA, Johannesburg and Santiago. Meanwhile B738s and F100s have been busy flying in WA. So Qantas is getting some revenue and some staff are working on top of the engineers looking after the grounded jets.
john
says:Why are Virgin given any of these high yielding flights to MEL from LHR & LAX ? They certainly need the money more than Qantas.
Dave
says:Ive seen VA doing a few to LAX and HKG. They’re smaller (and in administration) so you’d expect QF to do the majority of them.
Shane
says:Maybe they didn’t want them
Aaron
says:Because creditors’ it owes money to might impound their aircraft, as has happened here, would be one reason possibly.
Fredric
says:The Australian Govt gives the National Carrier, QANTAS, first preference, as is required.
Virgin’s in Vol Admin, & is NOT Australia’s National Carrier.
Dave
says:Ive seen VA doing a few to LAX and HKG. They’re smaller (and in administration) so you’d expect QF to do the majority of them.
Mark
says:Why not some additional flights to Sydney, Brisbane and Perth as well??
Mark
says:They need to keep the LAX /BNE weekly trip. They should alternate from LAX..one week BNE/Next week Melbourne. All these people don’t have pets so why add all the additional miles to Melbourne.
Geoff
says:Are there any passenger flights going in the opposite direction? We have a puppy to go to LAX which cannot go regular airfreight.
Alan Pace
says:Crazy as ! Flying pets around the World is weird on so any levels.
Scott
says:Exactly John, Allegedly they also got a disproportionately low amount from the 165mil “minimum domestic network” also. Nothing changes here.
JMB
says:This article is poorly researched nonsense. Qantas has suspended pet transportation indefinitely – as has Emirates and BA.
The fact that there are more emergency flights schedules has no impact on the suspension.
Allan
says:Alan, it’s not weird at all, as many people have their pets flown to different parts of the world, due work transfers’, extended holidays’, & even for people who’ve adopted pets from other countries’.
Animals’ usually travel in the cargo hold of planes, in a section which has oxygen pumped through it.
In Australia, ONLY service dogs’ are permitted into aircraft cabin. In the USA, it’s very different.
Here, Pre-COVID19, it would be unusual for a plane to depart without a few pets’ in the hold! Many travel so often, they could become ‘frequent flyers’ in their own right!