With Australia being one of the largest and most sparsely populated countries in the world, air transport soon became a fundamental enabler for the economic development of the country as it entered the modern era. Initially carrying mail between outback towns, by the 1930s Qantas was already flying passengers to Singapore.
The airline entered the jet age in June 1959, when the first Boeing 707 aircraft was delivered and global travel became mainstream. The 1980s marked a transition to an all Boeing 747 fleet, with the airline being privatized in 1990 and starting their own low-cost subsidiary, Jetstar.
A Staple of International Aviation
“The Flying Kangaroo,” as the airline has long been nicknamed, is the only carrier flying to all inhabited continents on earth, even as international flights have been suspended due to travel limitations imposed by the Australian government to curb the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic.
On July 22, 2002, the last Qantas Boeing 747 aircraft in service, VH-OEJ, flew from Sydney to Los Angeles International before positioning to the Mojave Desert for permanent storage and decommissioning. This put an end to 49 years of continuous service of the aircraft type for the carrier.
Another badge of distinction for Qantas is its unblemished safety record: no jet aircraft has ever been lost by the Australian carrier and no casualties have been recorded. However, between 1927 and 1945 the airline experienced eight fatal crashes with the loss of 63 lives, though those came before the widespread introduction of jet aircraft into the fleet.
Qantas was also the first airline to launch non-stop flights from Australia to London’s Heathrow Airport when, on March 25, 2018, a Boeing 787 aircraft made the 17-hour trip from Perth — located in Western Australia — to Heathrow. The carrier has launched the so-called “Project Sunrise” to launch non-stop flights from the Australian East Coast to both London Heathrow and New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport. The project has been put on hold due to the coronavirus pandemic.