Qatar Airways was the first airline to take delivery of the A350-1000. They currently have 6 A350-1000 in their fleet with a further 34 on order. They recently upgraded 5 A350-900s in the order book to the -1000 variants. These 5 may be used on flights to the west coast.
Qatar Airways in October started flying the Airbus A350-1000 on the Doha-JFK route instead of the Boeing 777-300ER. Now, Qatar Airways will upgrade the second frequency to an Airbus A350-1000 with Q suites from April 1, 2019. The second frequency is currently operated by an Airbus A350-900.
QR703 DOH 0215 – 0900 JFK A351 D
QR704 JFK 1105 – 0630 (+1 day) DOH A351 D
So now there will be 96 Q Suites available each way. This may represent a capacity increase on the second frequency but overall the seat count on Doha – New York remains almost the same.
Qatar Airways in October also shifted two of the three frequencies on Doha-Singapore route to an Airbus A350-1000. From March 31, 2019, onwards, Qatar Airways will operate the A350-1000 on the third frequency as well.
QR942 DOH2005 – 0905 (+1 day) SIN 351 D
QR943 SIN 1030 – 1325 DOH 351 D
This will help Qatar manage fuel burn due to the blockade as A350-1000 is more fuel efficient than both A350-900 and 77W.
Are you excited for the A350K flights to New York and Singapore?
The A350-900 that Qatar uses to JFK already has the QSuites but it is a capacity increase.
Aha. I was comparing 77W/A359 (643 seats) to A35K/A35K (654 seats). Hence almost the same (but yes an increase of 11 seats).