Qantas passengers hoping to jump from Darwin to Singapore in a single bound are facing a three month delay for the soon-to-be rebooted flights, with the airline pushing back the planned restart over three months to March 30, 2025.
Originally set to depart thrice-weekly from December 9, before toggling up to daily in March, the Embraer E190 flights will instead go direct to seven days a week straight out the gate.
Travellers booked to travel prior to March 30 are being notified of the change, with the options of a credit, refund or to rebook via Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, or Perth.
Those nimble QantasLink Embraer E190 feature 10 business class seats and 84 seats in economy, now lifting off as follows:
- QF353 will depart Darwin at 6.05pm, arriving into Singapore at 9.25pm
- QF354 will leave Singapore at 10.25pm, landing back in Darwin at 4.45am
Those times dovetail into the Singapore stopover of Qantas’ flagship QF1/QF2 superjumbo flights on the Kangaroo Route, which leaves Singapore for London at 11.25pm and lands in Singapore from London at 5.45pm.
Of course, Top End travellers have always had the option of flying with Singapore Airlines to Singapore – which boasts lie-flat business class beds on SQ’s Boeing 737 MAX, along with seatback video screens and WiFi, all of which are absent from the E190 – and then choosing between a raft of flights to London and elsewhere in the UK, across Europe and for that matter to the rest of Asia and the Americas.
But this isn’t stopping Qantas from waving the flag, with Qantas International CEO Cam Wallace previously saying the Singapore service will make for smoother connections “to popular destinations like Phuket and Kuala Lumpur with our partner airlines.”
The route is also about “strengthening the important trade, business and tourism links between Australia and Singapore,” Wallace added.
Business class passengers and eligible frequent flyers – including Qantas Club members – will have access to Darwin’s domestic Qantas Club lounge prior to clearing immigration and security, along with the Qantas International Business and First lounges at Singapore’s Changi Airport Terminal 1 before their return flight.
Qantas last operated direct flights between Darwin and Singapore in 2006.
By David Flynn,
Source ExecutiveTraveller
