SIA's long haul low cost subsidiary, Scoot, has announced that it plans to launch flights to Tianjin, China.
The airline will operate three weekly flights to Tianjin from its Singapore base, from 'second half' of this year. The flights will operate on board Scoot's Boeing 777-200ER aircraft (having been operated by SIA in a derated configuration).
Scoot begins operations on 26th June with daily flights to Sydney, followed by five weekly flights to Gold Coast.
March 2012 Archives
Qantas and China Eastern this morning announced the formation of jetStar Hong Kong, to be based at (obviously) Hong Kong.
Built in fellow OneWorld member Cathay Pacific's home turf, the new joint venture will be owned equally by Qantas (oneWorld) and China Eastern (SkyTeam). The new airline plans to begin operation in 2013 with flights to Japan, South Korea, Greater China and Southeast Asia. It will operate Airbus A320 aircraft, as usual with all jetStar airlines. The airline plans to grow to a fleet of 18 A320s by 2015.
This will be jetStar's fourth overseas venture followed by jetStar Singapore, Vietnam and the soon to begin Japan operation (and fifth if you count the smaller New Zealand operation too). Now what would be Cathay's response?
Kenya Airways has announced that effective 15th May, it will be launching flights to New Delhi in India. Delhi will be the airline's second Indian destination following Mumbai.
Given the airline's focus on North Asia, and following on from Ethiopian Airlines' Addis Ababa - Delhi - Hangzhou route, it might not be suprising if it decides to extend this route into an Asian stop in the future.
Schedule:
KQ220 NBO DEL 1350 2320 767 D2467
KQ221 DEL NBO 0050 0530 767 D1357
Commenting on the launch, Kenya Airways' CEO Titus Naikuni has stated that he would like to operate a double daily frequency to Mumbai as soon as possible.
Long awaited Congolese airline startup, Korongo Airlines, will launch operations on 16th April 2012. The airline is partly owned by Brussels Airlines and will begin operations with a single Boeing 737-300 and a BAe 146. The airline had been in preparations for a couple of years but had had various difficulties in getting the necessary government approvals from DRC. More routes for the BAe 146 can be expected soon.
Schedules:
Lubumbashi - Kinshasha
ZC101 FBM FIH 0730 0850 733 D1236
ZC107 FBM FIH 1030 1200 146 D7
ZC105 FBM FIH 1655 1815 733 D256
ZC102 FIH FBM 1020 1340 733 D1236
ZC108 FIH FBM 1245 1615 146 D7
ZC106 FIH FBM 1945 2305 733 D256
Lubumbashi - Johannesburg
ZC123 FBM JNB 0730 0945 733 D4
ZC123 FBM JNB 1510 1730 733 D7
ZC124 JNB FBM 1130 1350 733 D5
ZC124 JNB FBM 1850 2110 733 D7
Emirates Airline has today announced the launch of a new service to Washington, IAD effective 12th September. The announcement follows neighbour-rival Etihad Airways' announcement that it will be launching service to Washington effective 31st March 2013.
Emirates will now be beginning service to Washington full six months prior to the proposed Etihad launch, giving it ample lead time to build up market share.
Schedule:
EK231 DXB IAD 0220 0850 D 77W
EK232 IAD DXB 1055 0800+1 D 77W
The service will use 777-300ERs with First Class Suites.
When Etihad made the announcement for its Washington service one year ahead of launch, we all knew that it was only a matter of time before Emirates jumped in and began its service prior to Etihad, and the same has now happened. And when he announced the service, probably James Hogan knew too.
In an interesting turn of events, American Airlines has revealed on the GDS that it will be deploying Boeing 777 aircraft twice daily, on the Miami - Los Angeles service, from April onwards.
The new schedule is as follows..
AA299 MIA0810 - 1025LAX 772 D
AA271 MIA1115 - 1330LAX 772 D
AA1520 LAX1155 - 2020MIA 772 D
AA252 LAX1415 - 2210MIA 772 D
While it could simply be due to utilization concerns - June is usually not a month where AA deploys a 777 on the MIA-LAX route. Also interesting to note is that American will be introducing a Miami - Seattle flight from the same date, while it will also upgrade one of its Miami - London Heathrow flights to a 777.
In the event that the 777 becomes a regular stay (either seasonally or year round) on the MIA-LAX route, it could signal a step change in American's strategy. The deployment of a widebody, earlier than usual, on a trunk domestic route out of its key hubs - at the same time making a number of capacity improvements from the same hub - could indicate both a revitalised focus on Miami as a major AA hub as well as an attempt to increase its yield in a now very disciplined (capacity-wise) market.
This, together with US Airways' purchase of multiple web domains containing 'American Airlines' could tell a very interesting tale. But only the time can tell us for sure. Let us all wait and see...
Starting from 1st October 2012, Emirates Airline will add its third daily flight to Rome. The new flight will operate with Airbus A330-200 equipment and depart from the airline's new third European departures bank of 3am.
Schedules below
EK099 DXB FCO 0315 0735 332 NEW
EK097 DXB FCO 0920 1340 388 EK095 DXB FCO 1545 2005 77W
EK100 FCO DXB 1120 1910 - 332 NEW
EK098 FCO DXB 1525 2315 388 EK096 FCO DXB 2200 0550 77W
Qatar Airways, on its Twitter feed, today announced the launch of five new destinations for this year. The destination breakdown is as follows..
- Kilimanjaro - Daily Airbus A320 flights via Nairobi
- Belgrade - 4 times per week via Ankara
- Erbil - 4 times weekly A320s, from May
- Baghdad - 4 times weekly A320s, from June
- Yangon - 3 times per week A319s, from October
This post would be updated once the schedules for these routes are available.
No matter whether you consider Southend (IATA: SEN) as a 'London airport' or not - the reborn airport has made some significant progress recently.
Once the third busiest airport in London with frequent large aircraft, the airport in Essex, had long remained without much activity. However, following the Stobart Air Group's purchase of the airport in 2008 - the airport appears to have received a fresh lease of life.
With easyJet planning to begin a base at the airport in April - the latest airline to start operations from the airport is AerLingus Regional.
EI3302 DUB 0915 - 1050 SEN AT4 D
Operated by AerArann (which in turn is soon set to become exclusively AerLingus Regional), the service will connect Dublin with Southend three times a day. The service operated with ATR 42 aircraft appears to effectively have one aircraft based at Southend for operating the route.
The schedule for the service is listed below.
EI3301 SEN 0700 - 0845 DUB AT4 D
EI3305 SEN 1255 - 1440 DUB AT4 D
EI3306 DUB 1510 - 1645 SEN AT4 D
EI3307 SEN 1710 - 1855 DUB AT4 D
EI3308 DUB 1920 - 2055 SEN AT4 D
The new service is well marketed by the airport as a link that provides easy connections to the USA. The Customs pre-clearance facilities in Ireland seems to have come handy! The services are also well timed for business passengers - providing them with an alternate option to the congested main airports of London.
It is also worth noting that AerArann, is partially owned by Stobart Group, the parent company of the same group which owns the airport. This seems to have helped the airport to also secure a service to Waterford operated by AerArann.
The airport is next target is to achieve a two million passenger throughput by the year 2020. The ambitions of Southend are also helped by some quick transit options for visiting the London city - which includes a train station providing quick connections to the London city. The airport's tagline of 'simply easier' too seems to be promoting the less congested nature of the airport.
Nevertheless, becoming a 'preferred' airport for London may well take a long time for the airport as it faces much established and more financially powerful competitors on its way. And it is quite likely that it will be at least a decade away before the airport can secure its first scheduled inter-continental flight - although that probably is not in the airport's plans either.
Southend certainly has a long way to go - but taking one step at a time - it seems to be preparing to regain its past glory.
Airline codeshare routes update for the week of 24 February - 2 March, 2012.
- Air New Zealand and ANA will begin code-share service between Japan and New Zealand effective 25th March 2012. ANA code will be placed on ANZ's flights from Auckland to Osaka Kansai (NZ097/8) and Tokyo Narita (NZ099/90)
- Etihad Airways and Hainan Airlines will begin code-sharing when the latter places its HU code on Etihad's routes to China (Beijing, Chengdu, Shanghai) and Khartoum out of Abu Dhabi.
- Continental Airlines and EVA Air will begin code-sharing effective 1st March. The agreement covers EVA's services to Los Angeles, San Francisco and Seattle as well as Continental domestic services out of the above bases.
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