russyyz wrote:

xwb777 wrote:
Saudia aims to be a 5 star airline by the end of 2019


HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

Best joke in a long time.

One can't have five star if we can't all be treated equally in each class, and we can't drink wine on board.

Well.. let us see if they can acheive what they claim.

Norwegian launches CPH - AMM twice weekly starting from 08MAY18, operated by Norwegian International B738.

Gulf Air upgauges 2/7 weekly BAH-KRT and 1/3 weekly BAH-ADD flights from A320 to A330

Emirates one-off A380 flight has landed in Beirut.

xwb777 wrote:

Emirates one-off A380 flight has landed in Beirut.

Its interesting as they parked at gate 1 which has only one jetway and not at gate 2 which has two. I wonder why. That must have been a very slower deplaning

olba wrote:

xwb777 wrote:

Emirates one-off A380 flight has landed in Beirut.

Its interesting as they parked at gate 1 which has only one jetway and not at gate 2 which has two. I wonder why. That must have been a very slower deplaning

There is much more space around Gate 1 actually, using gate 2 would have also disabled 1 and 3, whereas using gate 1 only disabled gate 2. Plus gate 1 is as far as you can be from passport control, slowing doing the influx of passengers through customs and thus dispersing congestion.

They used the jetway and a stair at the rear for deplaning. Not the best scenario, but it worked out fine. Let’s see if this leads Emirates to consider regular A380 service to Beirut.

Saudia will introduce a "Bistro service" in economy class as it will start offering Arabian Coffee, dates, hot chocolate , tea , American Coffee, entrees and hot/cold towels for passengers as it makes it way to be a 5 star airline.

Transavia launches 2 weekly Beirut service from Amsterdam from November 1st 2018

First connection between BEY and AMS since KLM dropped the route in 2006.

EK to keep ZAG as daily during W18 season.

Iraqi Airways is to use 747s on some flights between Najaf and Karachi https://www.flightradar24.com/data/flights/ia432

Pakistan was re-introduced to IA network in February as once weekly each 737-800 from Baghdad and Najaf.

Can anyone post the FY 2017-18 pax traffic of the top 10 GCC airports?

Cham Air of Syria plans Belgrade service from 01.06.2018. They have applied for three weekly flights onboard the A320.

Arrival to BEG: 13.00
Departure from BEG: 15.00

Interesting route.

Source:
http://www.exyuaviation.com/2018/04/syr ... mment-form

Kuwait Airport Update:

Kuwait Airways: Ending Bangalore (June 2 2018)

Jazzera: Continues its expansion into India with Mumbai starting May 9th daily adding to Kochi, Ahmedabad, & Hyderabad. They have also started Madinah (Saudi Arabia)

Wataniya: On their web page looks like Malaga is on the cards. Haven’t seen anything official yet but they keep adding new routes on their webpage and then announcing them.

Philippines Airlines: Will stop flying to Kuwait May 16th 2018 - With the issues between both governments there has been a major drop in travel.

Air Arabia Egypt: Started Sohag flights

British airways: Yes again showings us how Kuwait is not an important route downgrading the daily flight to a 777 from a 747. Traffic between Kuwait and London is up 37% in 2017 to around 370,000 pax. Sad to see how BA treats Kuwait I will not be flying their garbage 777 switching to KU or the Gulf airlines and I’m a Silver Oneworld client

Growth: Airport continues to see growth out of Kuwait with total pax numbers up 20% for the first 3 months at 3,584,320. If all holds we should be at 15 - 16 million pax. New terminals will help a lot but my feeling is the traffic will continue to be bad until 2022 when the new airport opens

airway1 wrote:

Kuwait Airport Update:

Kuwait Airways: Ending Bangalore (June 2 2018)

Jazzera: Continues its expansion into India with Mumbai starting May 9th daily adding to Kochi, Ahmedabad, & Hyderabad. They have also started Madinah (Saudi Arabia)

Wataniya: On their web page looks like Malaga is on the cards. Haven’t seen anything official yet but they keep adding new routes on their webpage and then announcing them.

Philippines Airlines: Will stop flying to Kuwait May 16th 2018 - With the issues between both governments there has been a major drop in travel.

Air Arabia Egypt: Started Sohag flights

British airways: Yes again showings us how Kuwait is not an important route downgrading the daily flight to a 777 from a 747. Traffic between Kuwait and London is up 37% in 2017 to around 370,000 pax. Sad to see how BA treats Kuwait I will not be flying their garbage 777 switching to KU or the Gulf airlines and I’m a Silver Oneworld client

Growth: Airport continues to see growth out of Kuwait with total pax numbers up 20% for the first 3 months at 3,584,320. If all holds we should be at 15 - 16 million pax. New terminals will help a lot but my feeling is the traffic will continue to be bad until 2022 when the new airport opens

BA used to operate the B747 to DXB on one of their 3 daily flights. Now all flights are operated by the B777-200ER. It seems that Riyadh is still getting the queen.

Iraqi Airways is adding or added Ahmedabad, India.

Gulf Air has leased (looks like a wet-lease) an A321 from Al Masriya Universal Airlines (SU-TCG)

Quite an old frame, and is almost exclusively operating Pakistan flights

Etihad launches one weekly Nottingham-Belgrade-Abu Dhabi cargo flight.

Kuwait Airways Lunching this summer Malaga & Milan & Tbilisi, Trabzon, Confirmed 100% That said Nice and Casablanca both under evaluation.

Etihad increases flights to BEG and GYD while replacing the A320 to Nairobi with A330.

Gulf Air in recent schedule update filed latest round of service expansion, scheduled to begin in June 2018. Additional frequencies/capacity will be added on following routes.

Bahrain – Amman eff 10JUN18 Increase from 2 to 3 daily
Bahrain – Athens eff 15JUN18 Increase from 5 to 7 weekly
Bahrain – Baghdad eff 15JUN18 Increase from 3 to 5 weekly, subject to Government Approval
Bahrain – Beirut eff 15JUN18 Increase from 1 to 2 daily
Bahrain – Istanbul Ataturk eff 11JUN18 Increase from 9 to 12 weekly
Bahrain – Khartoum eff 16JUN18 2 of 7 weekly operated by A330, replacing A320 (Previously scheduled from 29MAR18)

Separately, the airline has increased Bahrain – Larnaca service from 5 to 7 weekly since 25MAR18, previously not reported on Airlineroute.

source: https://www.routesonline.com/news/38/ai ... june-2018/

From 02.06 Etihad Cargo will further boost its BEG operations by increasing it from 1 to 2 weekly.

Qatar Airways has submitted a request to increase BEG from current 7 to 11 weekly flights. New ones to be operated with the following schedule:

DOH-BEG 15.45-20.10
BEG-DOH 23.10-05.10

MEB3 in BEG:

EY: 12x
QR: 11x
FZ: 7x

PIA ended Kuwait after more than 40 years service, also dropped Salalah, Oman. Plans to expand Saudi network with Ta'if and Gassim.

Gulf Air operated 787 to Peshawar the other day.

Several EK B777s has left the storage at DWC and headed back to DXB.

[quote="airway1"]Kuwait Airport Update:

Kuwait Airways: Ending Bangalore (June 2 2018)

Jazzera: Continues its expansion into India with Mumbai starting May 9th daily adding to Kochi, Ahmedabad, & Hyderabad. They have also started Madinah (Saudi Arabia)

Wataniya: On their web page looks like Malaga is on the cards. Haven’t seen anything official yet but they keep adding new routes on their webpage and then announcing them.

Philippines Airlines: Will stop flying to Kuwait May 16th 2018 - With the issues between both governments there has been a major drop in travel.

Air Arabia Egypt: Started Sohag flights

British airways: Yes again showings us how Kuwait is not an important route downgrading the daily flight to a 777 from a 747. Traffic between Kuwait and London is up 37% in 2017 to around 370,000 pax. Sad to see how BA treats Kuwait I will not be flying their garbage 777 switching to KU or the Gulf airlines and I’m a Silver Oneworld client

Growth: Airport continues to see growth out of Kuwait with total pax numbers up 20% for the first 3 months at 3,584,320. If all holds we should be at 15 - 16 million pax. New terminals will help a lot but my feeling is the traffic will continue to be bad until 2022 when the new airport opens[/

I’d prefer BA’s 777 over the 747 to be honest.

Emirates to add a 3rd daily flight to Dublin.

They have just said they are not adding a 3rd daily to DUB, not that they were adding a flight.

User001 wrote:

They have just said they are not adding a 3rd daily to DUB, not that they were adding a flight.

Ireland station manager has stated that the plans for a 3rd flight are currently on hold due to some issues at the airport.

Yes exactly. On hold means they are not launching it.

Royal Jordanian to wet lease 3 aircraft during the busy summer period. (2 A319 from Shaheen Airways and 1 B737-300 from Star Air).

Flydubai has dropped 3 destinations in KSA ( AlJauf, Hofuf and Yanbu)
Flydubai has add a 4th daily flight to Amman.
Flydubai to increase flights to Baku from 3xdaily to upto 6xdaily between 14JUN-15SEP.
Flydubai to increase flights to Sarajevo from 3xweekly to 3xdaily between 16JUN-15SEP.

xwb777 wrote:

Royal Jordanian to wet lease 3 aircraft during the busy summer period. (2 A319 from Shaheen Airways and 1 B737-300 from Star Air).

Heard 4 from Shaheen as they are dropping A319 fleet .

PIA will link Doha to Islamabad from 31 May, Airblue has ended Dammam service.

Starting from tomorrow 01JUN18:

Emirates will up upgrade its second daily Moscow flight (EK133/134) to the A380.
Emirates will start a non-stop flight to EWR.
Emirates will reinstate the second daily flight to Lisbon.
Emirates will begin flying the A380 to Houston.

Oman Air to phase the whole E175 fleet by the end of 2018 and the A330 fleet by 2023. The airline is also expected to place a new wide body aircraft order.

Jazeera returns to Lahore after seven years, from 26 June thrice a week, the only Pakistani city it served.

Two Shaheen A319 may go to Fly Egypt.

Etihad will be dropping Dhaka.

Etihad reduces LAX to 3 weekly

xwb777 wrote:

Oman Air to phase the whole E175 fleet by the end of 2018 and the A330 fleet by 2023. The airline is also expected to place a new wide body aircraft order.

I assume it will be B787-8/9

xwb777 wrote:

Etihad will be dropping Dhaka.

Etihad reduces LAX to 3 weekly

Dhaka is as shocking when they dropped Tehran. Is there even a point to serve LAX with three weekly flights? I don't see how they can be competitive at all.

Blerg wrote:

xwb777 wrote:

Etihad will be dropping Dhaka.

Etihad reduces LAX to 3 weekly

Dhaka is as shocking when they dropped Tehran. Is there even a point to serve LAX with three weekly flights? I don't see how they can be competitive at all.

Yeah Dhaka and Tehran are pretty shocking, its weird that they din't have enough passengers to even fill a a320 for Tehran and Dhaka.

Slash787 wrote:

Blerg wrote:

xwb777 wrote:

Etihad will be dropping Dhaka.

Etihad reduces LAX to 3 weekly

Dhaka is as shocking when they dropped Tehran. Is there even a point to serve LAX with three weekly flights? I don't see how they can be competitive at all.

Yeah Dhaka and Tehran are pretty shocking, its weird that they din't have enough passengers to even fill a a320 for Tehran and Dhaka.

I mean, Tehran can be understood as many airlines rushed to open it once sanctions were removed so maybe they struggled there. That said, QR actually increased capacity on the route so one has to wonder how competitive Etihad actually is. That's why I am shocked they will fly just three times per week to LAX. What can they do with that? They will collect leftovers, those who are flexible and who are chasing the cheapest fare on the market. I am sure LAX will be suspended after summer.

Blerg wrote:

Slash787 wrote:

Blerg wrote:

Dhaka is as shocking when they dropped Tehran. Is there even a point to serve LAX with three weekly flights? I don't see how they can be competitive at all.

Yeah Dhaka and Tehran are pretty shocking, its weird that they din't have enough passengers to even fill a a320 for Tehran and Dhaka.

I mean, Tehran can be understood as many airlines rushed to open it once sanctions were removed so maybe they struggled there.

It was served since 2007.

Latest: British Airways owner (IAG) CEO:

“I can see a sustainable case for two hubs in the Middle East [Emirates at Dubai, Qatar at Doha] but I struggle to see that for three (Etihad). Etihad has done many things that people question”

Emirates will add a 3rd daily flight to Moscow operated by a B777

Etihad might upgrade Toronto to A380.

Starting from tomorrow, Emirates will start its second daily flight to Auckland via Bali.

Etihad ends Dar es Salam. The routeis currently saved daily with the A320. last flight is on 30SEP18.

Etihad and Cobalt signed an interline agreement. Cobalt stepped in to replace Etihad in LCA but I doubt this combination will be successful.

starting from tomorrow 15/6, Emirates will be flying the A380 to ATH for a period of 2 weeks.

MEA started Madrid today sending their latest A330 (OD-MEE).

I also had a question. I hear that they will make a decision on 5 new wide bodies soon (A330neo or B787), seems like its most probably the A330neo and they will swap their current A330s. Does it make sense to order more than 5 at this point? Especially when some European destinations can use the 332 more often like FRA and LHR (sometimes it is 320) while they can also use the capacity for the Gulf destinations. I think having 5 might be too little for their opps. Every time I go from DXB to BEY, the 332 is always packed.