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Happy hour for enthusiasts as Qantas sells 747 bar carts

written by Adam Thorn | September 24, 2020

Qantas has announced it will sell bar carts from its final 747s fully-stocked with champagne, Tim Tams and red wine – but enthusiasts will have to fork out up to $1,500.

The airline is making 1,000 of the memorabilia available to customers, with each one averaging around 2,000 flights.

“There has been huge demand for Qantas 747 memorabilia and Frequent Flyers have expressed keen interest to convert the bespoke inflight trolley into everything from lamp stands to storage units,” said Qantas executive manager of product and service, Phil Capps.

Qantas retired the last of its 747s, VH-OEJ, back in July when it sold it, along with five others, to General Electric. It’s now located within the Mojave Air and Space Port in California.

Enthusiasts can either buy a half cart from $974.70 including delivery (or 169,000 Qantas Points), or a larger full-sized cart with double the items for $1474.70 including delivery (or 256,000 Qantas Points).

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The half bar cart features:

  • 40 mini bottles white wine and 40 mini bottles of red wine and 1 bottle of Champagne from the Business class cellar
  • 2 Qantas Business Class amenity kit featuring ASPAR Travel Essentials
  • 1 Sheridan throw made exclusively for Qantas First Class made of 100% combed cotton
  • 2 Qantas Business Class sleeper suits M/L & L/XL (suitable for most shapes and sizes)

“These pre-loved carts served Qantas and our customers well during their world travels from London and Los Angeles to Singapore and Santiago, with each one averaging around 2,000 flights. While we no longer have use for them, they still have life in them, especially for those with an appreciation for aviation collectables and an eye for design.

“The fact they come fully stocked with some of Qantas’ most popular on-board service items will hopefully inspire some high-flying fun at home.”

VH-OEJ’s final journey began on Wednesday, 22 July when QF7474 departed Sydney at 3:28pm on the first leg of its trip to LAX.

After an emotional take-off to the tune of I Still Call Australia Home, first-leg captain Sharelle Quinn flew the aircraft over Sydney’s CBD, Harbour and beaches before heading to the HARS Museum, where she dipped its wings in a final salute to the first 747-400 housed at the attraction, VH-OJA.

Then, unexpectedly, Quinn drew a 275-kilometre x 250-kilometre Qantas Kangaroo in the sky.

Hundreds of thousands of Twitter and Instagram users shared Qantas’ official post of the stunt.

When it finished, VH-OEJ climbed to cruising altitude and headed for Los Angeles, where it touched down at 1:23pm after 15 hours in the air.

Twitter user Owen Zupp captured the moment the plane came in to rest at LAX.

The plane then had one last flight to its final resting place at the Mojave Air and Space Port, which was captured by Twitter user Sam Chui.

The two final trips followed three special flights for customers departing the week before in Sydney, Brisbane and Canberra.

Proceeds from those ticket sales were donated to the HARS Aviation Museum in NSW and the Qantas Founders Museum in Longreach, Queensland. Both currently have 747s on public display.

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Comment (1)

  • Talking about aircraft going to the Desert. QANTAS has there remaining Boeing 787-900 aircraft outstanding on order from Boeing. They are airframe line numbers 1019, 1035 and 1051.

    1019, VH-ZNL was completed (and manufactured ready for its first delivery flight) on 4th June 2020, but has not yet had its first delivery test flight. It is therefore sitting on the Boeing Everett flight line waiting its fate.

    1035, VH-ZNM was completed and rolled out on 21st July 2020 at Everett and readied for an Acceptance Test flight. However Qantas has presumably chosen not to accept the aircraft and instead it has been flown to Victorville on the 17th September for storage in the desert presumably with the Qantas 12 A380 aircraft put there into long term storage until 2022 or 2023.

    1051, VH-ZNN is also completed and ready for its first test flight for acceptance. This roll out at the Everett centre ready for test flights was completed on 3rd September 2020.

    I feel that its likely that VH-ZNN is likely to also follow VH-NM to Victorville, but Qantas may be thinking of accepting VH-ZNL to use on domestic flights once Victoria opens up, expected to occur on the 19th October, or even possibly be used on some London or US repatriation flights to Australia.

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