Delivering on a brand promise of “a world class flying experience” Vistara is the first full service carrier in India to introduce a ‘Premium Economy’ class to the domestic market. It will configure its A320s in a 148-seat arrangement with 16 seats in Business Class, 36 in Premium Economy and 96 in Economy Class.
The four times weekly Naples – Madrid route, flown by an Air Italy Boeing 737, has joined Bologna, Genoa and Geneva as new destinations to be served by Meridiana from Naples International Airport in the winter 2014/2015 schedule.
This will mark the return of direct flights into Asia for the Scandinavian flag carrier from Sweden’s capital city. In the past ten years it has previously offered links from Stockholm to both Beijing and Bangkok, the latter on a seasonal winter basis, but these were both suspended from spring 2009.
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.
With the additional flights, Qatar Airways will now have four early morning departures connecting via Doha to Europe and the Americas and four early evening departures connecting to flights in the Asia Pacific region. A mix of morning and evening flights means convenient connections for passengers from Salalah to key markets in the Qatar Airways’ route network of 146 destinations.
The predominantly leisure markets will be served by the new ‘Jump’ business of the carrier which will see Lufthansa CityLine fly up to 14 Airbus A340-300s reconfigured in a higher-density, three-class, 298-seat arrangement under the Lufthansa brand.
The deployment of the Super Jumbo will take effect from May 1, 2015 and will mean that alongside its partner Qantas, a total of seven daily A380 services will operate from Dubai to Australia from next summer.
Its latest growth for the first quarter of 2015 will see another three destinations added to its route map, further expanding the carrier’s footprint to 89 destinations in 46 countries. These comprise flights to Hargeisa (Somaliland), Chennai (India), and Nejran (Saudi Arabia).
The low-cost carrier has announced new services from its Budapest base to Hurghada on the East coast of Egypt and Alghero in Sardinia, Italy, for the summer 2015 season.
US major, United Airlines is to operate additional flights to Shanghai and Chengdu from the airline’s hub in San Francisco, during the peak summer travel season. The announcement comes in the same week as a report by OAG, which considers a China-US open skies agreement.
Vietnam Airlines has opened reservations for its first Airbus A350XWB services this week. The airline will be the second operator of the new generation widebody airliner after Qatar Airways and plans to deploy the aircraft on its route between Hanoi and Paris CDG from the end of the third quarter 2015.
Over the past ten years the country's largest international gateway, Tbilisi International Airport has seen a substantial growth in international seat capacity.
The new link will be the only scheduled international link from Lorient to the Mediterranean and will see the Irish carrier generate an estimated 18,000 passengers per year to Lorient, a seaport in the Morbihan department in Brittany in north-western France.
The growth into Belize with regular flights to Philip S W Goldson International Airport in Belize City, will add a second destination in Central America, a seventh country, and the 96th city to the Southwest route map.
Air NZ has clearly defined aspirations for growth in the Pacific Rim. Its flights to Singapore commence next month and this new route to Buenos Aires will further strengthen its network in this area. The airline hopes to open reservations on the new service around March 2015, subject to obtaining necessary approvals.
Regional Express (Rex), the Australian airline have received their Area Air Operator’s Certificate (AAOC) from the Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA).
