MAS Privatisation

[Craig 0]

12 hours ago, Robert said:

Am I correct that the A339 can't do these routes without payload restrictions?

There should be payload restrictions westbound during winter or if there are any air space closure that requires a deviation (e.g. MH is avoiding Iran now).

[JuliusWong 0]

13 hours ago, Robert said:

Am I correct that the A339 can't do these routes without payload restrictions?

Potentially face issue during winter doing westbound flight just like what happened when they had their B777-200ER. B787-8/9 would be able to do the route effortlessly, but that would require a new fleet introduction. Hence why MH is dribbling to add another 3 A359 towards end of the decade.

A330neo is a beast of an aircraft, a far cry from its first and second generation, we shall see how it performs once MH resumes operation to both routes.

[jahur 0]

This is the near direct headwind that persisted for nearly 2.5hours for the westbound trip yesterday at 101knots!. Technically anything past Austria, Poland, Italy requires some adjustment to the commercial payload for the A339Neo now made worse with the instability with Iran and Ukraine there's not a lot of direct straight tracking. Again unless MH consistently flies with less than 220 pax on the intended westbound routes then there should be no issues even down to LHR AMS or even Nordic or to start from BKK with even greater safe margins. 

[Robert 0]

17 minutes ago, jahur said:

This is the near direct headwind that persisted for nearly 2.5hours for the westbound trip yesterday at 101knots!. Technically anything past Austria, Poland, Italy requires some adjustment to the commercial payload for the A339Neo now made worse with the instability with Iran and Ukraine there's not a lot of direct straight tracking. Again unless MH consistently flies with less than 220 pax on the intended westbound routes then there should be no issues even down to LHR AMS or even Nordic or to start from BKK with even greater safe margins. 

Thanks. Presume that you are a pilot as you have captured this pic?

[jahur 0]

41 minutes ago, Robert said:

Thanks. Presume that you are a pilot as you have captured this pic?

No but its been shared by another pilot on a middle eastern based airline heading to turkey. Again seasonal winds are usually one of the issues with long haul.

[Robert 0]

17 minutes ago, jahur said:

No but its been shared by another pilot on a middle eastern based airline heading to turkey. Again seasonal winds are usually one of the issues with long haul.

yes as well at it being all uphill to Europe (joke)

[jahur 0]

7 minutes ago, Robert said:

yes as well at it being all uphill to Europe (joke)

Yes but the return flight is splendid LOL.

Anyways all these stuff where manufacturers say product x and y can go bazzilion miles is actuallly based on optimum condition like maybe predicted headwinds of not more than 40knots. Maybe light interior fitting etc and definitely a low to light moderate passenger density config.

It was one of the sole reason people got sceptic when airasia wanted to do an all KL direct to London with an 377 seater A339neo. Even french bee A359 with more than 400 passengers has some significant performance restriction in its range.

[Craig 0]

If anyone is fortunate enough to fly great distances over similar-ish mid latitude, one can certainly feel the huge difference. i.e. LAX-HKG can be 15.5-16 hours flying time on a bad day where as HKG-LAX can be as quick as 12.5. A JFK-HKG route can be faster (assuming you can overfly over Russia) in winter than LAX-HKG even tho JFK-HKG is about 800 miles further.

[Craig 0]

Even MH's 350 suffer a payload restriction with the current air space closures. MH will not carry cargo from KUL to LHR for the next 2 weeks until 30 April. 

[Robert 0]

3 hours ago, Craig said:

Even MH's 350 suffer a payload restriction with the current air space closures. MH will not carry cargo from KUL to LHR for the next 2 weeks until 30 April. 

Ouch this will hurt the bottom line

[Robert 0]

I see that some of the AKL flights are using a 333. 

Any idea how much of a payload restriction they typically have.=>

[jahur 0]

33 minutes ago, Robert said:

I see that some of the AKL flights are using a 333. 

Any idea how much of a payload restriction they typically have.=>

If i recall last time before they took the 6 A332. For A333 to AKL 3 rows of economy class seats are blocked with no passengers plus 0 commercial cargo freight on the lower compartment.

The A333 can be flown up to 10 hour routes which does not include additional flying time for 2 landing attempts, diversion to alternate airport(45min to 1hour) and maybe 15-20minutes of extra loitering time. So the aircraft can actually fly longer than 10hours.

Edited April 17 by jahur

[Craig 0]

MH has canceled several flights to/from Sarawak and Sabah due to Mt. Ruang's eruption in North Sulawesi. You'd think that this would be more prominent on their website but no, it's like a small rotating ticker at the top. 

I wish more Asian airlines (cough *MH*) have EU/North American carriers style waivers for weather/industrial related events (industrial much less common here). Free change if you want to change your flights for an extended period (usually 2-4 weeks) or free change and waived fare difference if it's within a few days from the affected day(s). MH used to offer free changes, waived change fees for schedule change and it can be done online - not too sure if they still have this.

[jahur 0]

Ak, Mh have put up advance notice and cancel flights way ahead. FY and OD as of now have yet to officially cancel asking pax to wait for further updates lol.

On the otherhand some indonesias super air jet were flying very low levels 12500feet at kalimantan to avoid ash cloud. 

[jani 0]

8 minutes ago, Craig said:

MH has canceled several flights to/from Sarawak and Sabah due to Mt. Ruang's eruption in North Sulawesi. You'd think that this would be more prominent on their website but no, it's like a small rotating ticker at the top. 

 

Speaking of disaster-management, a friend is stuck at DXB because EK have been poor in communicating issues as well. However of course the magnitude in scale is much more significant

[Craig 0]

32 minutes ago, jahur said:

Ak, Mh have put up advance notice and cancel flights way ahead. FY and OD as of now have yet to officially cancel asking pax to wait for further updates lol.

Interesting. AK5136 (KUL-BKI) is on approach to BKI, AK 5302 (JHB-BKI) is on its way to BKI, and MH 7427 (SDK-KUL)is taxiing out as we speak. It looks like the whole Sabah East Coast all the way to North Sulawesi is no go. There's also MH3061 (SDK-TWU) which I guess they are flying below the ash clouds.

29 minutes ago, jani said:

Speaking of disaster-management, a friend is stuck at DXB because EK have been poor in communicating issues as well. However of course the magnitude in scale is much more significant

DXB is kinda like a meltdown. So a few order of magnitude difference 😅 This is probably why US/EU carriers (especially UA/AC) invested heavily on their IT to make sure that passengers can rebook themselves rather than calling/in person at the airport. I don't know if EK has that capability. 

But then again, I don't know if Malaysians are tech savvy enough to change their flights themselves when a Gen Z doesn't know how to read 24 hour clock system. 

Edited April 18 by Craig

[jahur 0]

3 minutes ago, Craig said:

Interesting. AK5136 (KUL-BKI) is on approach to BKI, AK 5302 (JHB-BKI) is on its way to BKI, and MH 7427 (SDK-KUL)is taxiing out as we speak. It looks like the whole Sabah East Coast all the way to North Sulawesi is no go. There's also MH3061 (SDK-TWU) which I guess they are flying below the ash clouds.

Depends on timing. Cause the cancelled flights for KUL to BKI KCH is based on MET forecast on when and where the ashcloud will reach the predicted areas some earlier flights are completely unaffected.

Low level cruise is one of the ways to avoid but not fuel efficient except super air jet was doing it lol.

 

 

[Craig 0]

Just now, jahur said:

Depends on timing. Cause the cancelled flights for KUL to BKI KCH is based on MET forecast on when and where the ashcloud will reach the predicted areas some earlier flights are completely unaffected.

Good to know. Thank you.

[jahur 0]

14 minutes ago, Craig said:

DXB is kinda like a meltdown. So a few order of magnitude difference 😅 This is probably why US carriers (especially UA/AC) invested heavily on their IT to make sure that passengers can rebook themselves rather than calling/in person at the airport. I don't know if EK has that capability. 

DXB is more of the city not financing planning proper drainage system for a torrential rain that originally happens once every few years. But same time their gov is doing 180ish annual cloud seeding to secure water and agriculture stability. So even 45minutes of torrential rain is enough to put the city into a halt now made worse with unintended result potentially from cloud seeding.

Edited April 18 by jahur

[Robert 0]

54 minutes ago, Craig said:

But then again, I don't know if Malaysians are tech savvy enough to change their flights themselves when a Gen Z doesn't know how to read 24 hour clock system. 

LOL - Im waiting for one to change their flight to DUB and get upset when they end up in the  wrong place. 

[jahur 0]

[jahur 0]

If we rewind this back to 14 years ago with a disruption like this. Would probably see MH sending in 2 B747-400 for KCH  BKI back to back to clear up the backlog up to late night. For now 1-2 A330s should be call up on standby but will effect domino effects on some of the international flights.

[Craig 0]

2 hours ago, jahur said:

DXB is more of the city not financing planning proper drainage system for a torrential rain that originally happens once every few years. 

That and also this was once in a century storm. Not saying that they shouldn't invest in proper drainage system, but countries do not usually build drainage to handle a year's worth of rain in 24 hours. If KL had 140+mm (5+ inches) in 24 hours, it'd overwhelm our drainage system too but of course it wouldn't be as bad as what Dubai experienced, but good luck to Sri Muda or Puchong.

1 hour ago, jahur said:

If we rewind this back to 14 years ago with a disruption like this. Would probably see MH sending in 2 B747-400 for KCH  BKI back to back to clear up the backlog up to late night. For now 1-2 A330s should be call up on standby but will effect domino effects on some of the international flights.

Are there still a lot of post-raya demand? I still see MH 7xxx series flying around so I assume there will be some backlog. What does black/blue box on your map indicates? 

1 hour ago, Robert said:

LOL - Im waiting for one to change their flight to DUB and get upset when they end up in the  wrong place. 

I am curious how many South Africans end up in JHB when they are supposed to buy a ticket to JNB (JHB is often referred to Johannesburg in South Africa with the exception of air travelers, just like how 99% of Malaysians call Air Asia AA *facepalm*).

[Robert 0]

3 minutes ago, Craig said:

That and also this was once in a century storm. Not saying that they shouldn't invest in proper drainage system, but countries do not usually build drainage to handle a year's worth of rain in 24 hours. If KL had 140+mm (5+ inches) in 24 hours, it'd overwhelm our drainage system too but of course it wouldn't be as bad as what Dubai experienced, but good luck to Sri Muda or Puchong.

Are there still a lot of post-raya demand? I still see MH 7xxx series flying around so I assume there will be some backlog. What does black/blue box on your map indicates? 

I am curious how many South Africans end up in JHB when they are supposed to buy a ticket to JNB (JHB is often referred to Johannesburg in South Africa with the exception of air travelers, just like how 99% of Malaysians call Air Asia AA *facepalm*).

many years ago I worked for a major courier company. Many of the misrouting issues were simply due to people dropping a small package/document into the wrong bag. Dublin / Dubai were always getting mixed up. There were one or two others but the names escape me right now. 

[Craig 0]

It seems like Air Asia has a travel waiver in place.

Quote

In light of this weather event, AirAsia is making the following options available to guests whose flights have been cancelled:

Move Flight: One-time change to any new travel date within 30 days from the original departure date on the same route without additional cost and subject to seat availability; OR

Credit Account: Retain the value of the flight booking in the guest’s airasia Rewards member account for future travel with AirAsia to be redeemed within 730 calendar days (2 years) from the issuance date. The travel date of the new booking can fall on any date within the published flight schedule on airasia.com

Would be nice if MH let passengers know what their options are and also waive change fees and fare difference if they manage to reschedule within 30 days (this is very generous). I am curious if MH's waivers will be channeled through to OTAs etc. Even better would be a full refund option but that almost never happens on AK 😅

4 minutes ago, Robert said:

Dublin / Dubai were always getting mixed up. There were one or two others but the names escape me right now. 

I can see people typing DUB for Dubai and click on the wrong one.