Airbus says pitching A350 long range plane for Sydney-London non-stop flights

Airbus’s talks with Qantas about a plane that can fly 20 hours non-stop from Sydney to London are centred around the A350-900ULR rather than reviving a shorter A350 variant, an executive at the manufacturer said Thursday. The comments by Airbus’s Iain Grant, head of sales for the Pacific region, could quash industry speculation the planemaker may revive the smaller A350-800, which had been put on ice after poor sales. Qantas had publicly challenged Airbus and its US rival Boeing in August to boost the range of the A350 and 777X models to allow it to complete “the last frontier” of commercial flying by 2022. The speculation about the A350-800 revival arose after Qantas CEO Alan Joyce told industry publication Flightglobal this week that Airbus was “saying they may” consider a shorter-fuselage variant if the A350-900ULR (ultra long range) could not meet mission requirements. Airbus’s Grant, however, said at a media briefing Thursday that talks with Qantas remained about the A350-900ULR, the same variant that Singapore Airlines will receive next year to restart non-stop Singapore-New York flights. “We are bringing in our A350-900ULR which is going to do the Sydney-London mission and we are very comfortable with that and we will continue to work with them to meet their requirements,” he said of the Qantas challenge.<br/>