Qantas has revealed it will fly non-stop between Sydney and London from October next year on its new custom-built “Project Sunrise” aircraft.Airfares for the 21-hour flights will go on sale for the first time in February.It has been a project almost a decade in the making with the Australian carrier first announcing its ambitious plan to fly from the east coast of Australia to London or New York without stopping in 2017.`Airbus took on the challenge and Qantas ordered 12 custom-designed A350-1000ULR aircraft in 2022. After some delays, the first plane will finally be in Qantas’ hands in April.news.com.au is at Airbus headquarters in Toulouse, France to get all the details on the world-first flights.What time of day will the Sydney-London flight take off and land?The first flight will take off in October 2027 and it is expected to leave Sydney in the early afternoon and arrive early morning in London.How much are the airfares going to cost?We don’t know yet. They will go on sale in February 2027.Qantas CEO Vanessa Hudson said: “When we go on sale those prices will be really clear and they’ll be clear for 12 months out.”She said airfares change depending on demand but the new non-stop flights will be in the “existing fare structure”.“It’s not having a specific fare structure, but we do expect that we’re going to get a premium and we’ve said that,” she said.“We expect that we don’t need to get more than what we’re already getting on Perth-London and also Auckland-JFK. We get about a 20 per cent premium on those services now.”When will Qantas fly non-stop to New York?The good news is, while the first route was revealed as Sydney-London, non-stop flights to New York are not too far behind.Qantas needs three aircraft to service each route daily. The airline is due to receive five aircraft by November 2027.Ms Hudson said she expected to have non-stop flights between Sydney and New York by the end of 2027, even if they’re not daily.What about Melbourne?There has been no indication when Melbourne or even Brisbane could see the non-stop flights, only that there will be discussions after Sydney.When news.com.au asked Qantas chief financial officer Rob Marcolina why Sydney was chosen to kick start the Project Sunrise flights over Melbourne he said it was the size of the market that gave Sydney the advantage.“Either would have been a great choice, but one of them had to go first and I think we’re really comfortable with it coming out of Sydney,” said the CFO, who is from Melbourne himself but now lives in Sydney.Ms Hudson said they hoped the launch of Sydney-London would stimulate demand for the service out of other airports.“We’re going to be able to be announcing the routes progressively as the new aircraft come in over the next two and a half years,” she said. “Demand can change. We know how demand can change, and we’re going to be responsive to that.”Will the new aircraft fly on other existing routes?While the first six A350-1000ULRs will be used for Project Sunrise flights (Sydney to London and New York), the intention is for some of the other ultra-long range aircraft to be used on existing routes like Perth-London and Auckland-New York.Ms Hudson said it meant they could redeploy older aircraft and potentially further unlock new routes.“That will free up the 787 and enable us to expand the network more broadly,” she explained.“(An) exciting destination that we’ve wanted to fly to for years has been Chicago – locking in the east coast to Chicago. Potentially there are other ports in North America, in Canada, in South America and also from the west out of Perth to seasonally connect potentially Athens or Africa.”Does the launch of these new flights mean other routes will be axed?Ms Hudson said the demand for international travel was continually growing and the new Project Sunrise routes would be in addition to existing ones.“The other thing that is a really you know attractive part of the business case is that we also believe that there are customers who are flying on other carriers who will be really attracted to this proposition because what we know and what we’ve learned is that there is a segment of the market that’s being underserved at the moment, which is those who value getting there in one stop.”Australians on the east coast can currently fly Qantas to Europe via Singapore or Perth.Mr Marcolina said the airline’s partnership with Emirates (which Aussies can fly on to Europe via Dubai) would continue because there will still be customers who want to stop through the Middle East.Do people want to spend 21 hours non-stop in economy?Qantas is confident enough customers will, with both Ms Hudson and Mr Marcolina saying the option was particularly appealing to parents travelling with children.When asked if Ms Hudson herself would fly economy on the new flight she said she “absolutely” would.“I’ve spoken to a lot of families travelling with kids, and I know when I used to travel with my kids when they were young, waking them up and getting them off technically in the middle of the night in a midpoint, whether you’re in Asia or the Middle East … you know what they say never wake a sleeping baby,” the Qantas boss said.“A lot of the parents that I speak to have actually said this is their preferred way of going so that once the kids are asleep they stay asleep.”Ms Hudson highlighted the economy seats will have the highest pitch of any of Qantas’ international services at 34 inches, and this is in addition to the new wellbeing zone for passengers to get up and stretch.There will be 238 seats on the aircraft, which Mr Marcolina described as “not many”.The existing A350-1000 can seat over 350 passengers depending on what configuration airlines choose (Philippines Airlines has 382 seats).Is a 21-hour non-stop flight from Australia to London or New York appealing to you? 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