So just D/H from Lax to Sydney on a Delta A350-900. Had three hours in Sydney to bs with the crew going through customs and such. One the pilots said they had to do a packs off takeoff out of Lax. Total on board including crew were 35 and some belly freight. I will admit I took my really big 777 bag on this trip and some fruit that Australian customs confiscated.
If we're taking bets on an A350 replacing the MD11 here at Fedex plz put me in the negative column.

except just about every MD-11 takeoff is packs off.

Maybe he meant a “PAX OFF” takeoff 😂

My understanding is that speculation says it won’t be a -900. It would be a freighter specific variant. Something like the -1000 shortened in order to satisfy performance and specific number of LDs.

Previous discussion has been on a freighter version being the 350-950F, tweening the -900 and -1000 in length (the 3M+ stretch from a -900 allows one extra row of ULDs).

Ah gotcha, haven't been on the 11 for years. I guess that would make the 350 even worse then.

No I actually meant Wax on Wax off. Been practicing my kah-rah-tay during lockdown. :)

MD11 Replacement??
 

Just ran across this article/blog:

Airbus has stiff sales target for A350 freighter as it aims for MD-11F replacement
https://flyoutoday.com/airbus-has-st...-analyst-news/

Sure, FedEx could replace the MD-11 with the A350F. However, all parking spaces setup for MDs will have to be resized and repainted. That would require changing the parking ramps at a lot of airfields, not just Memphis.

Though using two 767’s to replace 1 MD has parking space challenges too. So something has to give.