staraustralia | Airbus A330-200 | VH-SAK | 2012-2021

staraustralia ordered the A330-200 along with the A321 in early 2010. The airline, after 7 years of successful service in Oceania, decided that it was time to move ahead to the next phase of expansion. With the goal in mind of offering the opportunity for people from all around the world to travel to Australia for cheap, staraustralia started looking for a long-haul aircraft to set the plan in motion. The two airliners that were considered were the A330 and the 787 Dreamliner, however the 787, facing mounting delays, being a piece of completely new technology and lacking commonality with the A320 fleet, which the A330 could offer, was ruled out, and in February 2010 staraustralia ordered 13 A330-200s with 10 options and 15 purchase rights. At the Paris Air Show in 2013 the airline firmed up its options, bringing the total amount of A330s to 23.

The first A330-200 arrived at staraustralia's Sydney headquarters on December 8th, 2012. With the A330, the airline introduced a new livery and brand, featuring a swoop on the front of the fuselage, a new font and a modernised logo. The A330 introduced the first premium cabin of staraustralia, in form of a Premium Economy seat. The A330s feature inflight entertainment screens for all passengers. 4A332, the first A330 flight of the airline, flew from Sydney to Auckland on December 14th, 2013. The first long haul route of the airline, between Sydney and Tokyo Haneda, was launched on January 19th, 2013, to much fanfare. Since then the airline has expanded its reach with the help of the A330s to China, South Korea, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Vietnam and Indonesia in Asia, Tahiti in French Polynesia and Honolulu in the United States. As opposed to the A320 family jets, which are named after Australian and New Zealander cities, the A330s are given a name of one of the destinations they fly to.

VH-SAK is the 11th A330 delivered to staraustralia. It arrived at its Melbourne base on March 30th, 2015 and was put into service the following afternoon. VH-SAK launched the airline's longest route from Melbourne to Honolulu, a 3x weekly service that has now been expanded to 5x weekly. Today the aircraft can be usually found flying from Melbourne to Perth, Auckland, Bali or Phuket. Like all A330s, it's configured with 28 Premium Economy seats in four rows with a 2-3-2 configuration featuring 38'' of pitch, and 297 Economy Class seats in a 2-4-2 configuration with a 31'' pitch.