Emirates Airline (Dubai) on December 5 touched down in Lyon, celebrating the airline’s third destination in France and fourth new European destination since the start of 2012.
Serviced by an Airbus A340-500 in three cabin classes, Emirates’ flights to Lyon will offer a total of 258 seats including; 12 First Class Suites, 42 seats in Business Class and 204 seats in Economy Class. The addition of this new Emirates service will see an overall capacity increase of 12 per cent in France.
In other news, on December 1, 2012 Emirates’ A380 destination list grew to 20, with Singapore and Moscow joining the airline’s double-decker network.
With the world’s largest fleet of A380 aircraft, at 27 and another four to be delivered up to the end of 2012, Emirates continues to set the pace for A380 deployment. In the four years since the A380 has been in operation over 11.5 million passengers have flown on the aircraft.
Emirates’ inaugural A380 service to Domodedovo International Airport in Moscow marks the first time a commercial A380 flight has touched down in the city reinforcing the airline’s long-term commitment to Russia. In addition to the launch of the A380 to Moscow, Emirates will also upgrade its daily St. Petersburg service, launching a Boeing 777-300 on the route today adding a further 688 seats per week on the route.
With the addition of A380 services, Emirates’ total capacity across four daily services from Dubai to Singapore increases to 1,659 seats daily. In Moscow the total capacity across two daily services from Dubai to Moscow increases to 775 seats daily.
Continuing with its swift A380 utilization from December 10th Emirates will operate all five daily services from London Heathrow with an A380. New York and Paris will also benefit from the upcoming A380 deliveries, each receiving their second daily A380 service from 1st January 2013. The extensive Emirates A380 network enables many customers to now travel onboard the A380 for the full length of their journey.
Passengers in all classes can enjoy Emirates’ award-winning ‘ice’ Digital Widescreen, the industry’s most sophisticated video and audio system, offering 1,400 channels of on-demand entertainment – the largest selection of programming in the sky.
Emirates now operates to 21 A380 destinations with new cities to be announced in the coming months.
Copyright Photo: Jay Selman. Airbus A340-541 A6-ERJ (msn 694) taxies at the Dubai hub.