Etihad Airways, the national airline of the United Arab Emirates (UAE), has announced plans to introduce a second daily non-stop service between Abu Dhabi and Melbourne from August 1, 2015. The additional flight will add more than 4,500 seats per week to the route, supporting strong two-way demand and also double the airline’s freight handling capacity providing new opportunities for trade.
The introduction of a second rotation, to be operated by a Boeing 777-300ER aircraft with eight seats in First Class, 40 in Business Class and 280 in Economy Class, will open a significant number of additional global city pairs via each destination.
“We commenced flights to Melbourne in 2009 and it has since become one of the strongest routes on our network. Together with Virgin Australia and our other partner airlines, we have built a large and loyal customer base which has asked us for more choice,” said James Hogan, president and chief executive officer, Etihad Airways.
“Significantly, we will be the only airline offering double daily non-stop flights between Melbourne and the UAE, and twice daily one-stop services to a vast network of business and leisure destinations worldwide,” he added, highlighting that Emirates Airline only offers a single daily rotation between its Dubai hub and Melbourne (albeit it does have a very strong partnership with Qantas on flights in and out of Australia).
Since Etihad commenced daily flights between Abu Dhabi and Melbourne in March 2009 the airline has carried more than 900,000 passengers on the route. The airline also has investments in sport, arts and culture, and community life in Melbourne through commercial partnerships with Etihad Stadium, Melbourne City Football Club, Sport Australia Hall of Fame, Melbourne Recital Centre and Islamic Museum of Australia.
“Etihad Airways has close ties to Australia with significant investments in our workforce, infrastructure, tourism, and commercial partnerships across four states. Investing more resources into Victoria not only deepens this commitment but also delivers major economic benefits – particularly through Etihad Cargo, the airline’s freight operation, and its support for two-way trade,” explained Hogan.
The new double daily schedule for Melbourne increases to 42 the total number of flights the airline operates between its four Australian gateways and its Abu Dhabi hub in conjunction with partner airline Virgin Australia. This includes double daily flights to Sydney and daily services to Brisbane and Perth.
In our analysis, below, we look in greater detail at the Australian international market and the greater role the three Middle East hub carriers of Emirates Airlines, Etihad Airways and Qatar Airways are playing in connecting passengers to and from the country. It is Emirates that has the strongest position and is ranked the second largest international operator in and out of Australia based on passenger demand in 2013: Etihad was ranked 12th and Qatar Airways 20th.
Together the three carriers had a 12.9 per cent share of the total international traffic in and out of Australia last year, but most notable were their rises in segment traffic versus the previous year of 20.6 per cent at Emirates, 26.6 per cent at Etihad and 53.4 per cent at Qatar Airways. Other airlines showing notable growth in 2013 in this market were Air New Zealand (up 33.8 per cent) and AirAsia X (up 22.7 per cent), while China Southern Airlines continued its notable rise having established itself in the Australian market in the previous two years.
Data provided by 
Related Content
