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THE LONGEST NON-STOP passenger flight touched down in Australia this morning after more than 19 hours in the air, a milestone journey from New York that Qantas hopes to parlay into commercial success.
Qantas flight QF7879 took 19 hours and 16 minutes to fly direct from New York to Sydney in the first of three “ultra-long-haul” journeys planned by the airline this year.
The national flag carrier is operating the test flights – which also include one from London to Sydney – as it weighs a rollout of regular services on marathon routes from the United States and Britain to Australia.
Just 49 people travelled on the Boeing 787-9 to minimise the weight on board and give the plane sufficient fuel range to travel more than 16,000 kilometres without re-fuelling.
Qantas CEO Alan Joyce called it “a really historic moment” for both the airline and world aviation.
“This is the first of three test flights that’s going to come up with recommendations about how we manage pilot fatigue (and) how we actually manage passenger jetlag,” he told reporters after arriving in Sydney.
“After 19 hours on this flight, I think we’ve gotten this right. It feels like we’ve been on a flight a lot shorter than that.”
Qantas / Twitter
Qantas / Twitter / Twitter
Jetlag
Qantas partnered with two Australian universities to monitor how jetlag affected the health of passengers and crew members as they crossed multiple time zones.
After boarding the flight, passengers set their watches to Sydney time and were kept awake until night fell in eastern Australia with lighting, exercise, caffeine and a spicy meal.
Six hours later, they were served a high-carbohydrate meal, told to avoid screens, and the lights were dimmed to encourage them to sleep through the night.
Professor Marie Carroll, a researcher from Sydney University who conducted the experiment, told AFP that she expected the innovative approach would result in “absolutely minimal” jetlag.
“I expect that they will have a normal day today and a normal night’s sleep tonight,” she said, adding that she felt “amazingly good” considering the flight time.
“It’s all an experiment to see if airlines can adjust their schedule of food, beverages, exercise and lighting to be in sync with the destination time.”
The four pilots on board – who rotated between flying duties – also wore devices that tracked their brain waves and alertness.
The Australian and International Pilots Association, which represents Qantas pilots, has raised concerns about whether pilots will get enough quality rest during ultra-long-range flights to maintain peak performance.
It has called for a “scientific long-term study” into the impacts on crews.
The airline says the test journeys are just one facet of the work it is doing to ensure the flights are operated safely.
Qantas last year introduced the first direct service from the western Australian city of Perth to London, with the 17-hour journey one of the longest passenger flights in the world.
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I want to say this early before it gets lost in the comments. This money is not our and never will be. If the case is ruled against apple the tax gets distributed to the other EU countries not us. Apple have already paid all the tax owed under Irish law to us. Its in our interest to support apple in this as it keeps them here defends our tax regeime.
@Thomas Kearns: you could pay every apple employee a million euro and still have 7 or 8 billion euro left for schools hospitals , upgrading infrastructure such as broadband etc . It might not be our money but its worth a lot more than apple can ever give us
@johnbrady: Do you not understnad my comment? We do not receive any of this money even if Apple lose the case. At the moment we are holding it in escrow to either be released back to Apple or to be distributed to other EU states. There is no scenario here that we receive these funds.
@johnbrady: Um…… what?
@Thomas Kearns: I’d still prefer if other European governments had the money than have it sitting in the Cayman Islands for Tim Cook to brag about having.
@Fifty Shades of Sé: That sets a terrible precedent that other EU states can just reach into the private companies that are registered in other countries. Would you be happy for Germany, France, etc to just take profits from a homegrown Irish company like Kerrygroup just because we exported goods to the EU?
Also the funds have to stay within the EU and used within the EU eitherway. If they try to transfer teh funds back to the US they will have to pay additional taxes there.
@Thomas Kearns: no place for common sense on this website, even though you are 100% right
@Thomas Kearns: indeed even if the comission wins, the proceeds will likely go to other EU states. Millions have already been spent in legal fees to defend apple so end of day we are only losing money.
With that being said, our low tax regime days are numbered and tax harmonisation in the EU is just a matter of time. Government needs to find other incentives to keep FDI coming into the country, and the tax base needs to be increased and diversified.
@Thomas Kearns: Don’t waste your time trying to educate those who just can’t appreciate that foreign direct investment into Ireland and Ireland’s tax policy over the last number of decades is what has made us the economy we are. Also, and interestingly (to a few anyhow), doesn’t the fact that some of this tax would have to be distributed to other tax authorities actually prove that Ireland did nothing wrong??? If these other jurisdictions had taxing rights all along, why should Ireland have taxed the income?
@Thomas Kearns: we could steal it. I’m fairly handy with a spoon, that might help
@Thomas Kearns: you are wrong there son. Other countries could try to make claims on the money, they might even be successful in that regard so a portion of the money and yes it could be a significant portion could get redistributed but to say Ireland won’t get to keep any of the money is incorrect.
@Sean: He’s completely correct. It seems most people don’t understand the issue at hand, which is that Apple’s tax maneuvering gave it an effective tax rate of about 0.05% on its European profits. Ergo this back tax is for EU profits passed through Irish division. The only reason we’re caught up in this is because of our tax breaks. In fact, if a lot of the French and German EU big-wigs had their way, we’d be hit with a hefty fine and a unified corp tax rate.
@Gabriel Chagas: “Tax harmonization in the EU is just a matter of time”.
Ireland was given a concession regarding our corporate rates if we voted YES to Lisbon mk 2. That concession could only be removed by us in a referendum and would almost certainly be rejected by the Irish voter. If it was forced upon us it would make the result of Lisbon mk 2 invalid.
@Thomas Kearns: I’d prefer if all corporations paid their fair share of tax instead of exploiting loopholes in tax laws to avoid doing so. I think it’s terribly wrong to allow Apple to say they make iPhones here just to avoid paying taxes that they can comfortably afford to pay. The EU has been enormously generous to Ireland over the years yet we’re helping Apple to impoverish it’s member states.
@Thomas Kearns: do we receive a share
@Gabriel Chagas: and yet we worry about Brexit and worry about Trump and fail to realise the EU is going to do us the most damage.
@Thomas Kearns: Has the time for an Irexit? Seems like the EU will come after our corporation tax rate soon too
@Thomas Kearns: this not true on a number of fronts. Firstly if its deemed illegal aid was provided by the Irish state apple have not paid all the is owed in taxes to Ireland. Secondly the tax policies for funneling money through Ireland and the double Dutch loophole have been closed. Therefore this case does not defend the current Tax regime.
@Frankie J: no place for facts by the looks of these tweets.
@Thomas Kearns: erm…..no expert but, pretty sure if you sell goods and services in a country and try to funnel it through a complex set of lower rate structures in another country to avoid paying tax it’s pretty much tax evasion……
@Gerard Anthony McBride: finally someone who has common sense….praise the lord
@Thomas Kearns: then why did the Irish Government spend Irish taxes to pursue this case in the first round with the judicial system. One would imagine that Apple Corp. should pay all costs.
What a waste of time and money, this is a vanity project for Vestager, proof is that she waited until the very last moment to say she was going to appeal. The appeal can only be heard on a point of law, which has already been rejected by the court.
@Kevin50: complete waste of money they have no chance of winning and never did in the first place!
@Kevin50: Exactly she is going to not win this, my memory isn’t as good as it was but in 1991 EU didn’t have competition legislation like we have now, 2007 was only 5 years after Nice and can’t remember when Lisbon treaties requirements were implemented.
If she wants to look at funnelling funds have a look at Belgium, Netherlands and others. I worked in companies in finance and I can assure her allegations against Apple are small beer.
@PaulOMahoney Irish: the EU rules on State Aid have always been in the Treaties and were there when we signed up in 1973
@PaulOMahoney Irish: original EEC Treaty of 1957 had the competition and state aid rules. Nothing new about this.
@Ciaran O’Mara: May have been on paper but certainly wasn’t implemented. France for example having a lot of goods passing through remote airports add additional costs to product while subsidising French companies. One example but it was rife
If we ever need that money, now is the time!
@Mary Walshe: It’s not our money. It’s money collected through sales in other jurisdictions and simply funneled through Apple’s Irish operations. If Europe win this case and Ireland receives this money, the Irish State will be up to its neck in claims from other European countries for their share. Our proportionally small share will be eaten up with court cases and legal costs and in the long run it will cost us more than we gain. So no, we don’t need this money.
@Tommy Roche: Actually, it’s worse than I thought. As Thomas correctly points out Apple have already paid the taxes due in Ireland, so we get nothing.
@Tommy Roche: it’s funny as well. The whole basis of this case being a competition law issue and indirectly a tax issue is completely lost in all discussion.
I’m not actually sure how much would be repayable to other member states. You would have to see how Apple had written their contracts.
Can anyone actually actually clearly state why it would be repayable to other countries, we’re talking about corporation tax here not sales tax and therefore it’s residual profits that matter not where the sales were made.
One way or the other the money isn’t ours and the Commission is going to lose its case.
Good on the European Commission to Appeal , and correctly so, as Apple funnelled massive profits out of this country, and were as a result not liable to pay tax to any state, which is illegal under European law .
@Timothy Culligan: do you have any idea what you’re talking about?
It was completely legal!
@Timothy Culligan: according to the EU courts so far, it’s not illegal.
@Timothy Culligan: guess you better tell the judge who ruled in favor of Apple then. Looks like you know more about the law than them.
@Timothy Culligan: the fact that you don’t know that you can’t “funnel” profits anywhere because profits are taxed and that if you’re going to “funnel” anything it would be revenue speaks volumes as to your knowledge.
The neverending story part MMXXIV
I am no expert but, if you sell goods and services in a country, then funnel said profits through a complex set of low rate tax structures in another country to avoid paying the going rate in the place you made the money in the first place I am pretty sure it’s tax evasion.
Apple and Ireland and dont forget the OECD, this wouldnt have happened if these mammoth companies were reined in. Of course some big countries dislike distrust and try to dismantle bodies like OECD UN WTO etc. If there isnt respect for international systems all we get is, dog eat dog and some individual major world powers think they can benefit from this but no it just leads to chaos and big business taking an unfair advantage.
@Michael: those massive companies provide us with a lot of employment.
@RampantMisanthropy: But do they really need to pay tax rates at 0.005%? Does it have to be THAT low?! They may employ loads, but we really are taking the mick with just how much they get away with relative to SME’s that pay 12.5% as standard.
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