Lufthansa is likely to receive the green light from Indian authorities to fly the A380 into Mumbai, but without the strong transfer traffic its current operating slot affords, it is unlikely to want to move the service to accommodate the utilisation of the larger aircraft and may have to wait up to 15 months until the airport completes work to support simultaneous A380 operations.
Like much of Icelandair’s existing North American network the destination will be served to support business and leisure demand in and out of Iceland as well as to provide new connectivity options for US travellers into the wider European market via the carrier’s Keflavik International Airport hub.
The 469-seat A380 will substitute a smaller Boeing 747-400 on the five London – San Francisco services boosting weekly capacity by just under 20 per cent. All nine other weekly rotations will continue to be served using the smaller Jumbos which are configured in either 299- or 337-seat arrangements.
All three markets have previously been served by Finnair with flights to Athens and Malta last operating in summer 2010 and services to Dublin last being flown in summer 2007. The flights will operate through the summer months only but strong performance could result in them being extended to year-round services in the future.
Basel has one of the highest concentrations of successful life sciences businesses in the world, including pharmaceuticals, biotechnology and medical technology organisations and this new link will provide a fast and reliable link into Russia and Asia for customers in the industry as well as the other industries that have grown up to support the healthcare market in Switzerland.
UK carrier Virgin Atlantic Airways is to suspend flights to Cape Town, Mumbai, Tokyo and Vancouver as it instead looks to strengthen its transatlantic partnership with shareholder Delta Air Lines. The latest network changes are part of an ongoing network review and business recovery plan to return the carrier to long-term profitability.
Condor will provide 518 seats per week to Portland and Providence including a Business Class offering using a Boeing 767-300 configured in three-class with 18 Business Class, 35 Premium Economy and 206 Economy seats. The Portland service will mark the return of flights to Oregon’s largest city from Frankfurt, a route previously served by Lufthansa up until September 2009.
The new Aer Lingus Regional operation will launch on October 23, 2014 and will be flown with 13 weekly services with two flights every day except Saturday when there will be just a single rotation. The carrier expects to carry up to 70,000 customers annually on the new route.
Air China will introduce a second daily rotation on its route between Beijing and London Heathrow from October 26, 2014, while China Eastern will boost its existing Shanghai route to the UK's largest international air gateway from October 29, 2014 with a sixth weekly flight.
The economic woes in Greece have had a profound effect on the aviation business in the country but passenger numbers at Athens International Airport Eleftherios Venizelos (AIA) have remained relatively robust and during the last quarter of 2013 the facility returned to growth.
The total traffic for the four days is an increase of 36 per cent over the same period at the end of Eid Al Fitr in 2013, when 133,007 passengers took an Etihad Airways flight.
Since launching flights on the Amritsar - Delhi - Birmingham route on a four times weekly schedule on August 1, 2013, the carrier has handled more than eighty thousand passengers onboard 210 return flights, providing better connectivity between the Midlands and India for business passengers, tourists and people visiting friends and relatives.
Qatar Airways will boost capacity on routes from Doha’s Hamad International Airport to Madrid and Perth through increased frequencies on the route to Europe and the permanent deployment of a larger capacity airliner on the Australian link.
According to a study by Oxford Economics, Air Serbia is making a significant contribution to the Serbian economy. The combined direct, indirect and induced economic contribution to the Serbian economy is expected to be more than US$700 million in 2014.
The grounding of the carrier follows just days after the European Union (EU) broadened its sanctions against Russia and added Dobrolet to its list of companies that EU persons and entities are prohibited from doing business with.
As Airbus and Boeing go head-to-head in negotiations for Emirates Airline’s outstanding order of 70 extra-widebodied aircraft, aviation intelligence expert OAG has revealed the critical importance of Emirates’ choice and how it could impact up to 88 per cent of the carrier’s flights.
