PHX787 From Japan, joined Mar 2012, 5102 posts, RR: 14 Posted (10 months 3 weeks 18 hours ago) and read 5752 times:
I've been in Tokyo for about 5 days but I've noticed something quite peculiar:
Finnair ads...all over the place and on a.net...in Japanese (my japanese is poor so I can't read them) and featuring cute Japanese crew members all dolled up in their garb and an A343.
What's the presence of Finnair in Japan? And what would make Japanese people want to go to Finland? It seems like some of the ads are advertising winter flights as well, which again doesn't make too much sense to me. What would they be advertising flights for?
tonystan From Ireland, joined Jan 2006, 1190 posts, RR: 2 Reply 1, posted (10 months 3 weeks 17 hours ago) and read 5719 times:
Finnair offer a very attractive and successful hub at Helsinki for onward connections throughout Europe. They have one of the largest european presences throughout the Far East as a result of this!
AY is rather big in Japan, they fly to NRT (10x weekly this summer), KIX (daily) and NGO (daily). Connections is the key word, the short cut from Western Europe to Japan goes via Finland.
In 1983 they became the first to offer non-stop service from Western Europe to Tokyo, first they flew the polar route using DC-10 with extra fuel tanks, Soviet Union didn't allowed them to fly over Siberia.
JAL is planning to open NRT-HEL route (787) next year, co-operating with AY.
Quoting PHX787 (Thread starter): And what would make Japanese people want to go to Finland? It seems like some of the ads are advertising winter flights as well, which again doesn't make too much sense to me. What would they be advertising flights for?
A big majority of AY's Japanese clients are transit passengers, but also Finland gets Japanese visitors. In winter the main attraction is the northern lights in Lapland, in the Japanese culture the lights bring good luck for newlyweds especially.
FlyingAY From Finland, joined Jun 2007, 648 posts, RR: 0 Reply 3, posted (10 months 3 weeks 16 hours ago) and read 5518 times:
As tonystan pointed out, Finnair's strategy is based on the Asian flights. HEL is conveniently located on the shortest route between Central Europe and many Asian destinations. They connect passengers between Europe and Asian cities. They've got 3 destinations in Japan (Nagoya, Narita and Osaka) as well as several in China plus ICN and SIN. Despite the small size there are not many European airlines that have more destinations in Asia (I'd guess LH and AF/KL have more, but not sure about BA?).
HEL airport has signs in Finnish, Swedish, English, Japanese and Mandarin and you can see a huge amount of Asians at the airport pretty much any time of the year.
HELyes From Finland, joined Oct 2010, 655 posts, RR: 1 Reply 6, posted (10 months 3 weeks 16 hours ago) and read 5435 times:
Quoting Finnaviation (Reply 4): Quoting HELyes (Reply 2):
first they flew the polar route using DC-10 with extra flew tanks, Soviet Union didn't allowed them to fly over Siberia.
HELyes From Finland, joined Oct 2010, 655 posts, RR: 1 Reply 8, posted (10 months 3 weeks 15 hours ago) and read 5250 times:
Quoting Finnaviation (Reply 7): Please no Wiki. Something more realiable needed for this.
True, Wiki not realiable but this isn't anything new information really. The problem was the routing on HEL-NRT, Narita slots is a different question.
Finnish Ministry of Foreign Affairs:
"Finnair started direct flights between Helsinki and Tokyo in 1983. The collapse of the Soviet Union enabled direct flights across Siperia, and the time of flight shortened considerably."
smws From Estonia, joined Jun 2012, 66 posts, RR: 0 Reply 9, posted (10 months 3 weeks 14 hours ago) and read 5078 times:
Quoting Finnaviation (Reply 7): Please no Wiki. Something more realiable needed for this.
There is nothing wrong with Wiki, especially as it (usually) has the required quotes and links to sources. In this case the wiki page for Finnair has these two links to FlightGlobal archives:
ilari From Finland, joined Jul 2005, 26 posts, RR: 0 Reply 10, posted (10 months 3 weeks 13 hours ago) and read 4941 times:
And not to forget that some Asians like the way of Finnish (or northern European in general) way of customer service. That's what I've read from some travel magazine.
okAY From Finland, joined Dec 2006, 554 posts, RR: 0 Reply 11, posted (10 months 3 weeks 13 hours ago) and read 4911 times:
I don't have any source for this, but as I remember the reasoning for Polar Route enroute to Tokyo, it was indeed the Japanese government saying no in order to protect JAL's monopoly on this (they said u can fly here, but u take the longer way), resulting JAL-flights being roughly 3 hours shorter between Japan and Europe, thus being more attractive to flying public. The Soviets did say yes, but with a very huge price tag. So, AY ordered a DC-10-30-ER and said let's go around it then, girls and boys Crew change at Rovaniemi for the Polar crossing, if I remember correctly? The flights were, however, succesful and remain to be so as far as I know.
Finnaviation From Finland, joined Mar 2007, 253 posts, RR: 0 Reply 12, posted (10 months 3 weeks 6 hours ago) and read 4460 times:
smws's first link:
Quote: The Finnish flag carrier took ten years to
win landing rights in Japan for its nonstop
service to Tokyo, and it has those
rights only on condition that it flies the
long way around (see route map). Since it
is highly likely that the carrier would have
been awarded Soviet overflying rights for
the route, Japan's condition is effectively the same as saying "Yes, you can fly nonstop
to Tokyo, but only on condition that
you fly slow aeroplanes, or go into the hold
for three hours at either end".
Viscount724 From Switzerland, joined Oct 2006, 21679 posts, RR: 23 Reply 13, posted (10 months 3 weeks 6 hours ago) and read 4383 times:
Quoting PHX787 (Thread starter): And what would make Japanese people want to go to Finland? It seems like some of the ads are advertising winter flights as well, which again doesn't make too much sense to me.
Excerpts from the first link above referring to winter tourism to Yellowknife, the capital of the Northwest Territories, one of Canada's 3 northern territories (Yukon, Northwest Territories, Nunavut):
Tourism attracts over 60,000 visitors annually, over 10,000 from Japan alone.
Aurora Village employs about 20 full-time Japanese staff each season, which runs from August to September and November to April. The word about the fantastic light show in Yellowknife has spread to other countries like Korea, where Don has recently signed an exclusive deal with a tour company.
q120 From Canada, joined Aug 2008, 253 posts, RR: 0 Reply 14, posted (10 months 3 weeks ago) and read 3376 times:
Quoting Viscount724 (Reply 13): Tourism attracts over 60,000 visitors annually, over 10,000 from Japan alone.
A popular myth in Canada has the Japanese believing that luck and wisdom come to children conceived under the Northern Lights. Tait dismissed the oft-repeated tale as "degrading nonsense" that originated from an episode of the television show "Northern Exposure."
I hear this all the time when im in Yellowknife lol
However beautiful the strategy, you should occasionally look at the results
PHX787 From Japan, joined Mar 2012, 5102 posts, RR: 14 Reply 15, posted (10 months 2 weeks 6 days 17 hours ago) and read 1929 times:
Quoting HELyes (Reply 2): A big majority of AY's Japanese clients are transit passengers, but also Finland gets Japanese visitors. In winter the main attraction is the northern lights in Lapland, in the Japanese culture the lights bring good luck for newlyweds especially.
I see that makes perfect sense! I can't believe I didn't catch the whole northern lights thing before (Japanese studies major here)
Quoting HELyes (Reply 5): China: PEK, PVG, CKG, HKG
Japan: NRT, KIX, NGO
Others: SIN, ICN, BKK, DEL
Thanks for the info. How long is the flight from HEL to NRT? What kind of equipment do they typically use?
RWA380 From United States of America, joined Feb 2005, 2220 posts, RR: 4 Reply 16, posted (10 months 2 weeks 6 days 17 hours ago) and read 1902 times:
Quoting HELyes (Reply 2): In 1983 they became the first to offer non-stop service from Western Europe to Tokyo, first they flew the polar route using DC-10 with extra fuel tanks, Soviet Union didn't allowed them to fly over Siberia
I didn't have the opportunity to see the link of a flight route map of AY's HEL-TYO flight, what was the routing like? Was the flight directly over the North pole and down into TYO, wouldn't there be other challenges, ie...N. Korea to deal with?
Quoting HELyes (Reply 8): "Back when one could not overfly the Soviet Union, that ment fitting a DC-10 with extra fuel thanks for a polar route from Helsinki to Tokyo."
Didn't JL operate NRT-ANC-XXX in Europe during the 80's? IIRC, a myriad of JL aircraft used ANC as a fueling point for European services, thus avoiding any Siberian issues.
Next Flights: AS PDX-SAN-LIH on 739/738 in F, HA LIH-HNL-KOA-OGG on 717 in Y, AS OGG-PDX on 738 in F
There you go, I didnt click on the links but story there is pretty much how I have heard it. I called my "source", my mother who used to be cabin crew for Finnair and she corrected me about the RVN stop-over, it was only when the ER-version was in maintenance and a "normal " DC-10 had to cover for her they were forced to do a technical stop-over at RVN, and also crew were changed as otherwise the duty period would have become too long. Also, the ER-version featured crew bunks, in front of R2 door, the other "tens" in AY fleet did not have these. Also, the ER-version was never owned by AY and was never in Finnish registry but stayed the whole time under American registry. Finnair has also had right from the beginning two Japanese crew members on board these flights, from 1983. Those days they were AY employees based at NRT.
HELyes From Finland, joined Oct 2010, 655 posts, RR: 1 Reply 18, posted (10 months 2 weeks 6 days 12 hours ago) and read 1630 times:
Quoting PHX787 (Reply 15): How long is the flight from HEL to NRT? What kind of equipment do they typically use?
HEL-NRT takes 9h 40min, they use both A333/343.
Quoting RWA380 (Reply 16): Was the flight directly over the North pole and down into TYO, wouldn't there be other challenges, ie...N. Korea to deal with?
The routing went from Helsinki north through the polar region and down the Bering Strait, this route took around 3h30min more than the current trans-Siberian route.
saleya22r From Finland, joined Mar 2007, 52 posts, RR: 0 Reply 19, posted (10 months 2 weeks 6 days 9 hours ago) and read 1501 times:
Quoting RWA380 (Reply 16): Didn't JL operate NRT-ANC-XXX in Europe during the 80's? IIRC, a myriad of JL aircraft used ANC as a fueling point for European services, thus avoiding any Siberian issues.
SAS was the pioneer however as most of you may know. They started the polar route with the DC-7 in 1957
I flew with them in August 1969 CPH -ANC –HND with a DC-8 (probably a -62) as an adolescent.
Some of the cabin crew were Japanese. However, some of the Soviet airspace was open that year (but not Siberia) . I flew BKK-CPH also with SK, a DC-8 as well(-50 as far as I can remember). Refueling in Tashkent USSR. There had to be a Soviet navigator.
Saleya22R
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Crew change at Rovaniemi for the Polar crossing, if I remember correctly? The flights were, however, succesful and remain to be so as far as I know.
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