There’s been a lot of bubbling about Turkish Airlines operating a direct service between Istanbul and Sydney… and its been troubling me how this is going to work… IF it’s going to work
Firstly, sheer direct traffic connections – is there enough local traffic to support such a route? Even if extra traffic comes from connecting travellers, will it be enough to sustain the route in the long term? I’m honestly not sure – there’s presume already thanks to the Falcon route (Emirates/Qantas via Dubai) and the Kangaroo Route (Hong Kong/Singapore/Bangkok).
The time on board – for those of you who don’t want to work out how long you’re aboard the plane, it’s roughly 16 hours aboard (assuming an equivalent ground speed of 600mph). That’s a hell of a long time to be in a seat- be it in a plush Business Bed, a reasonable Premium Economy seat or a crammed up Economy Seat
The length of the route is of major concern too. The route is almost the same distance (give or take 500 miles) than Singapore Airlines A30-500 Business class flight between Singapore and Newark. Considering Singapore Airlines is chopping the A340-500’s from its fleet shortly due to the cost of what can be described as a flying tanker for most of the flight. Turkish Airlines maybe considering using a 777-300ER for this… but is that the right equipment?
Whilst this could be a great promotional flight, I don’t honestly think it will work without a stopover (or a fifth freedom flight) – least of all due to fuel, but also to get more passengers both up and down route.
Unless I’m reading the market completely wrong… I have my doubts on this one.
What do you think?
These plans date back several years already, I heard it first in 2009.
So nothing new – and there might be a reason why they didn’t start it until today. On the other hand IST is convenient to connect and there are not too much options to choose for Europe – Australia?!
I think TK has a strong presence in Western Europe which is who this route would benefit from most. Instead two long flights say (LHR>SIN>SYD) you now have a shorter first flight say (LHR>IST>SYD). Plus Star Alliance’s network from Europe to Australia is rather weak. This will give it a boost.
A one stop flight from IST via DEL would be great too, given there’s no direct flight from DEL-SYD and a lot of traffic and given it will break the flight time into two not soo long flight
I’d always welcome competition since it may mean lower prices for the kangaroo/falcon route!!! 🙂
Turkish is willing to try things and drop them if they don’t work. So perhaps they’ll try it and see if they can fill it at an acceptable yield, and if they cannot, then add a stop or drop it. They don’t have many 1-stop flights, however, they tend to go non-stop from IST.
it will attract australian passengers travelling to the middle east, specifically Israel. Right now the only way to Israel from Australia (unless flying elal) is with at least 2 stops. This will create a route with only one stop over. This is major.
TK is competing with EK. It sees a competitive edge by having narrow bodies fly into smaller European and Asian cities than EK.
The volume of passengers between Europe and Australia/NZ is huge. Emirates alone has multiple daily flights to SYD, MEL, BNE, PER (and daily to ADL).
The airlines flying kangaroo route are generally at a disadvantage because they are based at one end of the route and have less destinations at the other end (or require an extra stop and transfer to a partner airline). Airlines based in the middle do better. Those with lots of destinations do best.