Planespotters at Sydney Airport have been handled to the primary Australian go to of Cathay Pacific’s retro-livery A350-900.
B-LRJ, decked out within the Seventies-Nineties “lettuce leaf sandwich” livery to mark the airline’s eightieth anniversary, arrived in Sydney at 7am on Wednesday morning working flight CX111 from Hong Kong.
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“This yr marks the eightieth anniversary of Cathay operations, and as we speak in Sydney was the primary time in Australia that the retro plane has arrived,” mentioned Nigel Chynoweth, Cathay’s space head of cargo, Australia & New Zealand.
“Cathay began working [passenger flights] into Sydney in 1974, and this livery was on the plane. So, there’s a variety of employees and a variety of frequent flyers who actually are related with this livery, after which in 1994 we acquired the newer ‘brushwing’.
“Cathay has an extended historical past with Australia. One of many founders was an Australian, Syd de Kantzow, and our first flight was a flight from Sydney to Hong Kong in 1946.”
B-LRJ was additionally the plane that operated the inaugural flight of Cathay Pacific’s return to Adelaide final yr, with the seasonal service to function till March. It was the primary time Cathay had operated common Adelaide providers since withdrawing from the route in 2020.
Cathay now operates to Adelaide, Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth and Cairns, alongside Auckland and Christchurch, making for round 100 providers per week to Australia and New Zealand.
Talking to Australian Aviation at a media occasion in Sydney final yr, Tom Kennedy, Cathay’s regional head of buyer journey and way of life, Southwest Pacific, mentioned Australia is “actually necessary” for the service.
“We’ve been working flights right here to Australia for 55 years. Perth, the truth is, was our very first port that we commenced flights to,” he mentioned.
“Australia is a long-standing, mature marketplace for Cathay, and we fly to all the main cities.
“All of our flights join as much as Hong Kong after which to 100 locations past Hong Kong, and Australia is correct up there by way of a key supply marketplace for Cathay, being a community service.”
The Commonwealth authorities final yr authorised growing passenger capability for Hong Kong to 84 flights per week, up from 70, and with no limits on cargo providers.
