<P> Qantas and American Airlines (AA) were two of the co-founding members of the Oneworld airline alliance, which was launched in 1999 . Dallas / Fort Worth International Airport (DFW) has long been American's headquarters and largest hub and is centrally located in the United States . Dallas is less than four hours from all cities in the continental United States and AA serves more of these airports from DFW than from Los Angeles, Qantas's main gateway to the United States . Los Angeles is also an AA hub, but is significantly smaller in terms of departures and destinations and located 4 - 5 hours from most east coast cities . In 2012, American operated nearly 500 departing flights daily from DFW, but fewer than 100 from Los Angeles . Dallas would be a logical destination for Qantas to serve, but it only had six aircraft with the 13,804 kilometres (8,577 mi) range needed to reach Dallas and they were needed for the Melbourne - Los Angeles and Sydney - Buenos Aires routes . The Boeing 747 - 400ER has a range of 14,205 kilometres (8,827 mi), although winds aloft and fuel needed for holding can trim that figure . </P> <P> Qantas had studied the feasibility of the Dallas route for years . At the time of the Great Recession, Qantas' Sydney - San Francisco service became unprofitable, while an open skies agreement between Australia & the US flooded the market with more capacity . In the meantime, the Boeing 747 - 400ER aircraft were replaced with A380s on the Melbourne - LA route . According to Qantas CEO Alan Joyce: "a lot of things clicked on this and it made absolute sense for us to devote aircraft resources to this destination ." By flying to Dallas, Qantas can offer passengers a 70 - minute connection to domestic flights, which means onwards connections to cities like New York City, Chicago, Boston, and Miami can be up to two hours faster than transiting through Los Angeles . At launch, Qantas had codeshare agreements on 54 AA flights from DFW to cities in the US, Canada, & Mexico . When announcing the launch of A380 service, Qantas notes that DFW offers more than 30 codeshare destinations beyond the network available from Los Angeles . According to Qantas in 2014, the most popular destinations for connections with QF7 are Orlando, Boston, Houston, and New York's LaGuardia Airport . </P> <P> Qantas began operating the Sydney - Dallas route--designated Flight 7 outbound and Flight 8 returning--on 16 May 2011 . The route was initially flown 4 times weekly, but was upgraded to daily service on 1 July 2012 . Flight 7, from Sydney to Dallas, flew non-stop in 15 hr 25 min . Due to strong headwinds, Flight 8 could not be flown non-stop and flew from Dallas to Brisbane Airport before returning to Sydney . Flights 7 & 8 were operated with a Boeing 747 - 400ER aircraft from 2011 until 28 September 2014 . </P> <P> When launched, Flight 7 was the longest regularly scheduled non-stop flight by distance operated with a Boeing 747 and the third - longest regularly scheduled non-stop commercial flight by distance--behind Singapore Airlines Flights 21 / 22 (Newark - Singapore; 15,345 km) and Singapore Airlines Flights 37 / 38 (Los Angeles - Singapore; 14,114 km). However, unlike the Qantas Boeing 747 - 400ER, the Singapore Airlines flights were flown with Airbus A340 - 500 aircraft configured with an all - business class cabin that carried only 100 passengers . </P>

How long is the flight from dfw to sydney