Re:The potentially revolutionary Celera 500L aircraft
by scarier on Thursday August 27, 2020 @03:46PM
(#24297818)
$328/hr is the advertised operating cost of the aircraft (fuel and maintenance), not anything close to what a charter would actually charge. Commercial airline operating costs, including crew salary and overhead, are roughly an order of magnitude more (~$3000/hour is a rough, somewhat conservative, number for something like a B737, including fuel, crew, maintenance, and aircraft depreciation/rental costs). The airline is paying under $20 per passenger-hour for all expenses, while a charter service operating with volunteer pilots, free airplanes, and no other costs would break even at ~$55 per passenger-hour (assuming the $328/hr estimate is accurate, which is still very much an open question for an aircraft that's still undergoing initial flight testing and may never be produced in significant volume). Even the best-case scenario doesn't strike me as particularly competitive.
$300/hour charter price with 6 seats for a 5 hour trip (2000 miles) is about $250 per seat each way. This is pretty competitive.