France and Germany are leading a call for the European Union to ensure fair competition between EU airlines and those from the Gulf region, who are accused of receiving major state backing.
The new flight between its Luxembourg base and the Indian city of Chennai, via Muscat International Airport, will operate from April 15, 2015 and is likely to be the start of an expected rapid growth in the Sultanate.
The carrier will offer a twice weekly service on the route from June 4, 2015, adding to its existing flights between Manila and Dubai, United Arab Emirates; Kuwait City, Kuwait and Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Cebu Pacific also currently serves Dammam, Saudi Arabia, but that flight will terminate at the end of this month.
While urging the US government to engage in consultations with the UAE and Qatar to address the capacity of the Gulf carriers into the United States, there is a call from the US majors for the US government to immediately call on these countries to halt the creation of any new routes into US market until the consultations are complete.
United Arab Emirates (UAE) carrier, Etihad Airways has announced its plans to increase flights between Abu Dhabi and Tehran from three-times-weekly to daily.
This study from Frontier Economics estimates that Emirates’ significant operations into Europe, including the catalytic impact of the 220 unique connections it offers, supported 85,100 jobs across the European Union in 2013/14, equivalent to €6.8 billion GDP. In addition, Emirates’ Airbus A380 deliveries for the same period supported 41,000 jobs, equivalent to €3.4 billion GDP.
The International Air Transport Association (IATA) announced global passenger statistics for January 2015, which indicate a slower start this year compared to 2015.
Qatar Airways first launched services to Pakistan twenty years ago when flights to Karachi commenced in 1995. It subsequently introduced direct links to Peshawar in 1995, Lahore in 1999 and Islamabad in 2004 and currently operates 45 flights a week into the country.
One of the most popular islands in Indonesia with spectacular mountains and picturesque beaches, Bali is a leading tourist destination which welcomed more than 3.7 million foreign tourist arrivals in 2014. Emirates’ new service will add to Bali’s global connectivity, further stimulating the island’s economic and tourism growth.
The US airlines claim that the Gulf giants have received around $42 billion in subsidies and are able to use these to operate with lower loads and offering lower fares, enticing passengers onto their own services. Delta Air Lines has been the most vocal of the three US carriers and how they have skewed the competitive landscape in Europe and the US.
Air Arabia signed a strategic partnership with the Ras Al Khaimah Department of Civil Aviation to become the Emirate’s designated carrier for passenger services from Ras Al Khaimah International Airport in spring 2014 following the collapse of RAK Airways.
The new flights from the Iraqi flag carrier will be the first non-stop scheduled links between Manchester and the country, although a previous charter series have linked the markets previously via a one-stop offering. Both routes will be flown using a new Boeing 737-800 configured with 162 seats.
Africa continues to play an important part in Qatar Airways’ global network expansion strategy and the airline currently operates 140 flights per week to 19 African gateways.
The aircraft will help Arkia to expand its growing operations into long-haul business and leisure markets and will operate alongside the four A321neo aircraft ordered by the carrier at the Farnborough International Airshow in 2012.
The budget carrier plans to links its Dubai International Airport base with Ahwaz, Hamadan, Isfahan, Shiraz and Tabriz from March 2015, adding to its existing flights to Tehran and Mashhad, which were only launched in August 2014.
Over a twelve-month period, preliminary data shows a growth rate of 5.1 percent year over year, with both international and domestic traffic posting strong growth rates of 5.8 percent and 4.5 percent respectively.
Senior executives from US majors American Airlines, Delta Air Lines and United Airlines have this past week met with two senior members of President Obama’s Cabinet and other senior administration officials to discuss a potential freeze on the number of flights that the Gulf carriers may operate into the USA, former US deputy assistant secretary of state, John Byerly, revealed during the Routes Americas Strategy Summit in Denver.
The airport has ended London Heathrow’s years of dominance as the world’s number one international hub, with its full year passenger numbers totalling 70,475,636 – a 6.1 percent rise from the previous year. A record 68.1 million international passengers used London’s Heathrow during the same period.
The Alitalia network will be one of the main pillars of the new strategy alongside Cooperation, Fleet, Guest Service and Brand with a new three-hub strategy in Italy being introduced.
Emirates first launched flights between Dubai and Kolkata in March 2006 as its seventh destination in India with a split schedule offering greater connectivity via its hub. A daily operation with this split schedule was introduced from early 2008, while a dedicated daily flight on the ‘EK570’ and ‘EK571’ departures came online from December 2009.
The confirmation of the landmark link ends over a year of speculation about the service after Gu Zhongqin, president of Xinjiang Airport Group, revealed in December 2013 that the airport authority was in discussions with the budget carrier to introduce the link, around a 4 hour and a half to five hour sector.
At Routesonline we've decided to take a look back at the news breaking the same week in previous years and revisit it one or two years later to see what’s happened since we released the news.
The new ‘Pharma Express’ route will see an Airbus A330-200F operate between Brussels and Basel and then on to Doha on a twice weekly basis from January 28, 2015 with flights every Wednesday and Saturday.
The introduction of the second A380 into the Manchester market will mean that half of Emirates’ 16 daily flights to the UK will be operated by an A380 from the start of next month.
During the inauguration ceremony for the Qatar Airways A350XWB, the GCEO of the airline, Mr Akbar Al Baker responded to questions including those relating to future routes for the A350.
