Fleets grounded, staff furloughed, routes axed. The COVID-19 pandemic has done much to bring the aviation industry to its knees and, as finance departments deployed their red pens, Boeing 747s from a raft of airlines were given their marching orders. British Airways, Virgin Atlantic, China Airlines, KLM, Qantas, Corsair – it seemed there wasn’t a passenger-configured 747 anywhere on earth that could consider itself safe.
Apart from Germany, where pent up demand for some long overdue summer sun prompted Lufthansa to dust off its 747-8i fleet. However, the German flag carrier’s four-class, 364-seat jumbos were being removed from the comfort zone of their usual transatlantic and intercontinental slogs to far-flung cities such as Shanghai, Sao Paulo and Los Angeles. Instead, they would be sent packing from Frankfurt to Palma, with the flight time a shade under two hours.