QantasLink Service to Hervey Bay
As reported in the Gossip several days ago QantasLink will soon commence services from Brisbane to Hervey Bay. Subject to regulatory approval QantasLink will commence services on October 29 with a schedule that provides for 32 flights to Brisbane each week.
The route will be serviced by Bombardier Dash 8 aircraft that can seat up to 36 passengers. That means that over 56000 additional seats will be available each year.
On the surface that may sound like great news for people who need to fly from Hervey Bay to Brisbane but, as our Federal local member pointed out yesterday, Hervey Bay has already been a Qantas destination on two previous occasions.
And on each of those occasions Qantas has subsequently withdrawn the service.
It seems that Qantas may be been trying to take advantage of the difficulties that Sunshine Express found itself in. Perhaps now that Rex has moved to take over Sunshine Express we might see QantasLink withdraw for a third time.
The Bombardier Q200 - the plane that QantasLink will be using on the Hervey Bay Route
Update: My thanks to Jacob for pointing out that the top image is a photo of the Bombardier Q400 - the aircraft QantasLink uses on the Gladstone, Rockhampton and Mackay services. The Q200 is the plane that will fly the Hervey Bay route and I’ve now added the right image.
August 23rd, 2006 at 9:05 pm
Hi i would just like to say that qantaslink would not be recommencing services to Hervey Bay unless it would see that the route was profitable. Which it obviously is. And i would just like to add that Qantaslink will be operating the Dash 8-Q200 on the route which is not the aircraft pictured above. The aircraft pictured above is the 72 seat Dash 8-Q400 which is also operated by Qantaslink on it’s Gladstone,Rockhampton, Mackay and Canberra services.
August 24th, 2006 at 6:53 am
Hello Jacob - thanks for pointing out the error - I’ve corrected it now by adding a photo of the Q200.
I’m not sure that I would agree with you that the Brisbane - Hervey Bay route is all that profitable at the moment although. It’s still cheaper to drive to Brisbane than it is to fly and when you drive there is less chance of being stranded in Brisbane because Sunshine Express doesn’t have a plane to bring you home.
That may sound hard to believe but I know of people who had that happen to them one Friday night only a month or so ago. In the end the company hired a mini-bus to bring them back to Hervey Bay and they arrived at 1.15am.
However, Qantas certainly has the resources to ensure that problems like that don’t happen again but whether they can make money on the route still remains to be seen.