News
Emirates adds Yangon, Oman leases extra B787s and SAUDIA awaits A330R
March 4th 2016
An Emirates Airline A380 flew into the record books on Wednesday when it landed in Auckland after completing the world’s longest direct commercial flight. Read More » The journey, which started 8,824 miles away in Dubai, exceeded Qantas Airways’ Sydney-Dallas A380 service by about 250 miles. However, only Emirates’ inaugural nonstop flight was operated by the A380. The regular service will use the B777-300ER.
Emirates is set to break its own record when it launches a 17 hours 35 minutes flight between Dubai and Panama City later this month. But there is speculation it may not happen. airlineroute.net reported this week that the carrier had postponed the launch indefinitely, including its codeshares with COPA Airlines.
But the Dubai carrier is continuing with its relentless expansion. On March 30, it will launch a daily Dubai-Clark-Cebu B777-300ER service and last Friday it announced it would commence a daily three-class Dubai-Yangon-Hanoi B777-300ER route from August 3.
Across the Gulf, Bahrain’s flag carrier, Gulf Air, is continuing its regional growth strategy after it decided it could not compete with its “Big Three” Gulf neighbours in the long-haul market. It will increase its flights to Riyadh from 28 to 32 a week.
In Saudi Arabia, SAUDIA will soon become the launch customer for the A330-300 Regional after Airbus said final assembly in Toulouse was “well underway”. With reduced weight, the A330R is optimized for high-density regional routes with a capacity for up to 400 passengers, on ranges up to 3,000 nautical miles. SAUDIA has 20 A330Rs on order through Middle East lessor, International Airfinance Corporation.
Further south, Muscat’s Oman Air is reported to have closed a three-year wet-lease agreement with Kenya Airways for two B787-8s after the latter ran into financial trouble which prompted it to sell off/return its entire B777 fleet. Oman Air, itself unprofitable but on a steady turnaround, has recently acquired a slot pair at London Heathrow, allowing it to double frequency from Muscat to the UK capital to twice daily.
At Etihad, its cargo division has taken delivery of a new B777 freighter to allow the freight arm of the airline to continue to expand. The aircraft is the 11th freighter in the fleet and entered commercial service on March 1, 2016.
