By ANGUS WHITLEY (Bloomberg) Qantas Airways Ltd. will run marathon ghost flights from New York and London to Sydney carrying just a few staff to see how the human body holds up before commercial services start. Qantas said Thursday it will simulate the world’s longest direct flights with Boeing Co. Dreamliners as soon as October. The payload of 40 passengers and crew, most of them employees, will undergo a host of medical checks and assessments. The Australian airline wants to start direct flights connecting Sydney to New York and London as soon as 2022. Chief Executive Officer Alan Joyce describes the services as aviation’s final frontier. The services, which take about 20 hours, aren’t yet a sure thing. Qantas still hasn’t decided on a Boeing or Airbus SE plane that can fly the route fully laden and without a break. And it’s not clear how passengers will tolerate living in the cabin for the best part of a day and night. “The things we learn on these flights will be invaluable,” Joyce said on a call Thursday. Joyce has previously said he plans to choose either Boeing’s 777-8X or Airbus’s ultra-long-range A350-900ULR and -1000ULR for the flights. Competition for the contract gives Qantas more leverage over price. In an interview with Bloomberg Television on Thursday, Joyce said the delay to Boeing’s 777X program hasn’t excluded the US manufacturer from the deal. He said Boeing had offered Qantas a “transitional” solution to accommodate for any delay. He didn’t elaborate. “This is still a very competitive race,” he said. Qantas Airways posted a 6.5-percent fall in annual net profit Thursday, attributing the slide in earnings to higher oil prices and a weaker Australian dollar, AFP reported yesterday. Despite record revenues, the Australian flag carrier said its after-tax profit fell to Aus$891 million (US$604 million), down from Aus$953 million the previous year. The 99-year-old airline was hit by an Aus$614-million fuel bill increase and Aus$154 million in foreign exchange impacts. But Qantas CEO Alan Joyce was upbeat about the results, which came on the back of healthy profits the previous year. “Even with headwinds like fuel costs and foreign exchange, we remain one of the best-performing airline groups in the world,” he said. In the 12 months to June 30, underlying profit before tax – the airline’s preferred measure that strips out one-off costs – was down 17 percent at Aus$1.3 billion. Qantas declared a final dividend of 13 cents per share and announced an off-market buyback of up to 79.7 million shares.