{"id":613200,"date":"2026-05-31T05:33:16","date_gmt":"2026-05-31T05:33:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/613200\/"},"modified":"2026-05-31T05:33:16","modified_gmt":"2026-05-31T05:33:16","slug":"the-worlds-longest-flight-will-take-off-from-the-uk-next-year","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/613200\/","title":{"rendered":"The World\u2019s Longest Flight Will Take Off From the UK Next Year"},"content":{"rendered":"

At the moment, if you wanted to get from London<\/a> to Sydney<\/a>, you\u2019re looking at an arduous 30 hour (or thereabouts) multi-stage journey complete with anxiety\u00a0over whether your baggage made it through the layover. Now, imagine if you could get to the Harbour City<\/a> on one non-stop 20 hour flight, instead. Wouldn\u2019t that be so much simpler?\u00a0<\/p>\n

Thanks to Australian airline Qantas, a direct flight from London to Sydney will be a real option within the next few years. Qantas has been working on Project Sunrise<\/a>, which will introduce flights between London and Sydney and New York and Sydney, since 2017. It says that the new links will overcome the \u2018tyranny of distance\u2019\/\u00a0<\/p>\n

Right now, the longest flight in the world is the 9,537 mile trip from\u00a0Singapore<\/a>\u00a0to\u00a0New York, which takes just over 18 hours.\u00a0The London to Sydney route\u00a0would overtake that, spanning\u00a010,573 miles.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Given that it\u2019s never been done before, the\u00a0average aircraft isn\u2019t built for\u00a0such a mammoth\u00a0journey. So Airbus is building 12 special A350 aircrafts with additional fuel tanks that will be able to take it on.\u00a0The vehicles will also have fewer seats than usual (238 instead of over 300)\u00a0to make space for passengers\u00a0to walk around, will be the first planes to have\u00a0a dedicated wellness zone<\/a>\u00a0and will have wi-fi access for all.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"Qantas
\nPhotograph: Dr. Victor Wong \/ Shutterstock.comQantas planes in Melbourne, Australia <\/p>\n

We thought that the flights would be up and running by early 2027<\/a> but this week, Qantas announced that there has been a holdup. Now, the first aircraft is due to be delivered in April 2027.\u00a0The delay is down to supply chain issues affecting Airbus due to the ongoing conflict in the Middle East.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Qantas\u00a0has promised that, despite the delay, it\u2019ll be back on its original schedule\u00a0by November. It\u2019ll announce its\u00a0new start\u00a0date, and whether the first route will serve London or New York, at an event at the Airbus HQ in Toulouse in June.<\/p>\n

A spokesperson for the airline said: \u2018While the first aircraft delivery has shifted to April 2027, the next four will follow in quick succession, putting us back on our original schedule by November.<\/p>\n

\u2018We continue to work closely with Airbus on the delivery and certification process that will enable us to begin operating these history-making ultra long-haul flights.\u2019<\/p>\n

Qantas\u2019 ultra-long-haul flights were were initially projected to be ready by 2022. But, like many, many other projects, it was delayed because of the Covid-19 pandemic. It was met with further delays because of issues with the additional fuel tank and was pushed to the first half of 2027.\u00a0<\/p>\n

ICYMI: This was the worst airport for delays in 2026<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Plus:\u00a0All the countries on the UK\u2019s \u2018do not travel\u2019 list for summer 2026<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Stay in the loop:\u00a0sign up to our free Time Out UK newsletter<\/a>\u00a0for the latest UK news and the best stuff happening across the country.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"At the moment, if you wanted to get from London to Sydney, you\u2019re looking at an arduous 30…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":613201,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[4821,59,57,58,50,4822,387,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-613200","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-kingdom","tag-categories-travel","tag-gb","tag-great-britain","tag-greatbritain","tag-news","tag-news-transport-travel","tag-travel","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/613200","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=613200"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/613200\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/613201"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=613200"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=613200"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=613200"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}