The new link will provide the first regular link between East Africa and Dublin and will mark the return of flights between the Irish capital and Los Angeles, a market last served by Aer Lingus in November 2008. This will strengthen Ireland’s connectivity to the west coast of the United States, with California a major market for Irish tourism.
Today, Emirates fleet investment in Africa tops $7 billion with operating costs of over $2 billion and it currently operates to 22 passenger and six dedicated freighter destinations in Africa perating over 160 flights across the continent each week, connecting African economies and markets with Dubai and beyond to a global network of over 140 major cities.
Bahrain, which is located in the Arabian Gulf, has a history of aviation that dates back to the early 1920's. Historically it has acted as a gateway between the East and West providing a natural transit destination for early trade routes and a strategic hub for the Northern Gulf.
The HUB spoke to MEC Michael Mabuyakhulu during this year’s World Routes in Chicago to learn more about next year’s World Routes when he described the event as the aviation equivalent of the Football World Cup, which was hosted by South Africa in 2010. In terms of hosting the event, he added: “Durban is ready, KwaZulu-Natal is ready and Africa is ready.”
The carrier’s entry into Tanzania is no real surprise as the country is a regional hub for tourism in East Africa and in 2013 the country welcomed over one million tourists. According to the Tanzania Tourism Board (TTB), this figure looks set with to double with two million tourists forecast by 2017.
As a record-breaking World Routes event in Chicago enters its last day, this lunchtime the Chicago Department of Aviation and Choose Chicago will officially hand the event over next year's host, the Province of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa.
Etihad Airways treated delegates to an engaging presentation at the 20th World Route Development Forum Strategy Summit, outlining the carrier’s expanded network by the end of 2015, writes Jonny Williamson for The HUB.
Subject to regulatory approvals, the new three times per week service between Mahé and Mumbai will be launched from December 2, 2015 and will be operated by a two-class Airbus A320 aircraft, configured with 16 Business Class and 120 Economy Class seats.
The airline has placed an order for 20 737 MAX 8s with options and purchase rights for a further 15 aircraft. It is the largest single Boeing order by number of aircraft from an African carrier and was previously unidentified in the Boeing order backlog as being placed by an unidentified customer.
The Tanzanian capital becomes the third destination in Air Seychelles’ Indian Ocean and African network, after Mauritius and Johannesburg and the new route will be operated using a two-class Airbus A320 aircraft with 16 Business Class and 120 Economy Class seats.
The network growth is being facilitated by the continuous growth of the airline’s fleet and the new non-stop Doha - Cape Town route will be operated by one of the carrier’s new Boeing 787 Dreamliners which are configured in a two-class arrangement with 22 Business Class and 232 Economy Class seats.
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.
The airline says forward bookings for the current twice-weekly flights are “well ahead of management expectations” and with the first flights from Zimbabwe already “operating to full capacity”, fastjet has quickly decided to boost the frequency of the link.
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.
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.
