Tag Archives: Airbus A340

Emirates to fly to Abuja and Kano in Nigeria

Emirates (Dubai) has announced a new daily service to Abuja and Kano from August 1, 2014. The announcement follows Emirates’ recent milestone of 10 years of successful operations to Lagos, to which the airline flies twice daily.

Abuja, located in the center of the country, is a planned city built largely during the 1980s which replaced Lagos as Nigeria’s capital in 1991. It is the seat of the Federal Government and home to most of Nigeria’s institutions, including the Central Bank of Nigeria and Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation. Abuja is also the headquarters of the Economic Community of West African States and the regional headquarters of the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries.

Kano, the capital of Kano State in northern Nigeria, is the second most populous city in Nigeria after Lagos, and has a history that goes back hundreds of years. The area is known for the production and export of groundnuts, which was a major source of Nigeria’s export earnings before the oil boom in the 1970s.

Emirates SkyCargo, the freight division of the airline, introduced a scheduled freighter service to Kano in October 2013, and with Abuja joining the network, Emirates will now fly to 26 destinations in Africa and 142 worldwide in 80 countries.

Emirates launched services to Nigeria on January 2, 2004 with four flights per week from Dubai to Lagos linked with Accra in Ghana, using an A330-200 aircraft. Just over a year later Emirates increased its services from four to six flights a week, and following further demand, it became a daily operation in October 2005. On January 1, 2006, Lagos was delinked from Accra and became a direct service to Dubai. On February 1, 2009, a second daily service was introduced, and today each flight is served with a Boeing 777-300 ER.

The route will be serviced by an Airbus A340-500 offering a total of 258 seats in a three class configuration – 12 in First Class, 42 in Business Class and 204 in Economy Class.

Abuja will be the first stop on the linked service on a Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Sunday, and Kano will be the first stop on a Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday. Emirates flight EK 785 will depart Dubai at 1030 and arrive in Abuja at 1450. The flight will depart Abuja at 1640 and arrive in Kano at 1750. The return flight will depart Kano at 2025 and arrive in Dubai at 0615 the next morning. Flight EK 786 will depart Dubai at 1030 and arrive in Kano at 1430. The flight will depart Kano at 1625 and arrive in Abuja at 1735. It will depart for Dubai at 2005 arriving at 0615 the next morning.

Emirates:

Virgin Atlantic Airways to drop service to Sydney on May 5

Virgin Atlantic Airways (London) is dropping all service to Sydney, Australia due to increasing costs. The carrier will drop the Hong Kong-Sydney extension on May 5. The airline will continue to operate the London (Heathrow)-Hong Kong portion of the route.

The airline issued this statement:

It is with regret that Virgin Atlantic has announced, its intention to withdraw operations between Sydney and Hong Kong from May 5, 2014, due to increasing costs and a challenging economic environment.

However, Virgin Atlantic will continue to operate services, between London Heathrow and Hong Kong.

Craig Kreeger, Chief Executive at Virgin Atlantic said:

“We intend to withdraw our services between Sydney and Hong Kong. Despite the best efforts of our employees, external factors such as increasing costs and a weakening Australian dollar have affected our profitability.”

“These are still difficult times for the airline industry and as part of our strategy to operate more efficiently we need to deploy our aircraft to routes with the right level of demand to be financially viable.”

At this stage, we will continue to operate our full published schedule below.


London Heathrow	21:30	Hong Kong	17:40	VS200
Hong Kong	19:10	Sydney	07:30*	VS200

Sydney	15:45	Hong Kong	22:00	VS201
Hong Kong	23:30	London Heathrow	04:50**	VS201

* +2 days
** + 1 day

Copyright Photo: John Adlard/AirlinersGallery.com. Airbus A340-642 G-VSHY (msn 383) in the 1999 livery completes its final approach to the runway in Sydney.

Virgin Atlantic Airways:

South African Airways to operate nonstop flights to New York (JFK) now starting on March 9

South African Airways (Johannesburg) has announced that it is resuming its nonstop flights between Johannesburg, South Africa, and New York – JFK International Airport. The nonstop flight will resume on March 9, nearly three weeks ahead of its original schedule of March 28.

While SAA’s New York-Johannesburg flight has continued to operate on a nonstop daily basis, the return flight has been temporarily making a one hour refuelling stop in Dakar, Senegal, due in part to lower travel demand during the winter months. The nonstop flight will be timed to arrive in New York in the early morning, allowing customers to quickly connect on flights to points throughout North America.

The nonstop flight schedule is as follows (all times are local):

Flight SA 203 departs Johannesburg at 8:25 pm (2025), arrives New York JFK at 6:40 am (0640) the next day Flight SA 204departs New York JFK at 11:15 am (1115), arrives Johannesburg at 8:00 am (0800) the next day.

Copyright Photo: Paul Denton/AirlinersGallery.com. South African Airways’ Airbus A340-642 ZS-SNH (msn 626) departs from the Johannesburg hub.

South African Airways:

Airblue to drop Manchester tomorrow

Airblue (Islamabad) will drop all flights to Manchester starting tomorrow (January 22). The airline issued this short statement:

Due to route rationalization, Airblue will be suspending flights between Pakistan and the United Kingdom effective on January 22, 2014. This includes the Lahore-Manchester and the Islamablad-Manchester routes. Passengers holding tickets issued by a travel agent for flights on or after January 22, may contact their travel agent for full refund without cancellation fees. Passengers holding tickets issued directly by Airblue may contact Airblue directly for full refund without cancellation fees.

Airblue is now concentrating its fleet around the Airbus A320 after returning both A319s.

Copyright Photo: Nik French/AirlinersGallery.com. Airblue was leasing two Airbus A340-300s for the routes. Both are now being returned with the retirement of the two routes to Manchester. Airbus A340-313X AP-EDE (msn 216) lands at Manchester.

Airblue:

JetBlue Airways and South African Airways begin code-sharing

JetBlue Airways (New York) and South African Airways (SAA) (Johannesburg) have launched their bilateral code-share agreement.

JetBlue is now placing its “B6” code on SAA-operated flights between the U.S. and Johannesburg, South Africa, as well as on connecting flights to select destinations beyond Johannesburg including Cape Town, Durban, East London and Port Elizabeth, South Africa.

SAA flies each day between both New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK) and Washington’s Dulles International Airport (IAD) and Johannesburg’s O.R. Tambo International Airport

Via its Johannesburg hub, SAA links the world to most cities and destinations across southern Africa and the Indian Ocean islands, including South Africa, Angola, Botswana, Kenya, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Tanzania, and Zambia.

Beginning in 2014, JetBlue will debut Mint, the carrier’s new premium offering, featuring the longest lie-flat bed in domestic business class and the only private suites on the New York-Los Angeles and New York-San Francisco routes.

At JFK Airport, JetBlue operates from its Terminal 5, while SAA operates from the adjacent Terminal 4, allowing for fast and easy connections between flights.

At Washington Dulles, both JetBlue and SAA are co-located in Concourse B.

Top Copyright Photo: James Helbock/AirlinersGallery.com. Standing out in the red FDNY special livery, Airbus A320-232 N615JB (msn 2461) arrives at Los Angeles International Airport.

JetBlue Airways:

South African Airways:

Bottom Copyright Photo: Brian McDonough/AirlinersGallery.com. South African Airways’ Airbus A340-313X ZS-SXE (msn 646) leaves the runway at Washington Dulles International Airport.

Emirates arrives in Afghanistan, its 78th country served

Emirates (Dubai) on December 4 launched its newest route to Kabul, Afghanistan.

Kabul is the 138th destination of the fast growing airline and Afghanistan is the 78th country now served by the carrier.

The route is operated by an Airbus A340-500 configured in a three cabin configuration, offering 12 First Class, 42 Business Class and 204 Economy Class seats. Emirates is the only airline which offers First Class from Dubai to Kabul.

EK 640 will depart Dubai daily at 09.55 hours and arrive in Kabul at 13.15. The return flight, EK 641 will leave Kabul at 15.30 hours and arrive back in Dubai at 18.00.

The day before on December 3 Emirates celebrated the launch of Airbus A380 service to Los Angeles, becoming the world’s longest A380 service in operation.

The landmark flight, crossing the Russian Federation, the North Pole and Eastern Canada, has a published duration of 16 hours 20 minutes, more than enough time to delve into over 400 hours of in-flight Hollywood movies.

Emirates:

Video: The A380 inaugural flight to Los Angeles:

Finnair to install Zodiac fully-flat seats on its long range aircraft

Finnair (Helsinki) has announced it will install new fully flat seats in most of its existing long haul aircraft starting in January. Once the installation program is completed by fall 2014, all of Finnair’s long haul Airbus fleet will have full flat seats in Business Class, with the exception of three older aircraft. These three aircraft will be the first to be removed from the fleet with the arrival of A350 XWBs in 2015. The total investment, including replacement investments, is approximately 29 million euros or approximately 39 million dollars.

The Zodiac Seats UK Vantage model seats selected by Finnair are already in use on the airline’s four newest Airbus A330s. The seats are designed to provide a fully-flat bed measuring up to 79 inches (200 cm), while shoulder room measures 23 inches (58 cm).The fully adjustable seats also come with an individual reading light, adjustable head rest, mood lights and a range of inflight entertainment options.

DIMENSIONS

Contour Vantage A330/A340

Seat width between armrest: 20.07 inches

Seat width at shoulder level: 22.83 inches

Bed length: 79.17 inches

Bed width at head level: 20 inches

Bed width at shoulder level: 20 inches

Bed width at hip level: 20 inches

Bed width at foot level: 10.98 inches

Copyright Photo: Ton Jochems/AirlinersGallery.com. Airbus A340-313E OH-LQE (msn 938) in the Oneworld design arrives at the Helsinki (HEL) hub.

Finnair:

Singapore Airlines ends nonstop Singapore-Newark flights

Singapore Airlines (Singapore) last night (November 23) ended the world’s longest nonstop air route (9,506 miles, 19 hours) when it ended nonstop Singapore-Newark service. Previously the airline ended Los Angeles-Singapore nonstop service on October 22.

Singapore was the first to operate the world’s longest nonstop commercial flight between Singapore and Los Angeles in February 2004 on the Airbus A340-500, and then surpassing the record (in terms of distance) later that year with the nonstop service to Newark in June 2004.

Singapore Airlines is retiring its long range Airbus A340-500s. Five were operated on the two long-range routes to both Los Angeles and Newark.

Read the full report from the Star-Ledger via nj.com: CLICK HERE

Copyright Photo: Ton Jochems/AirlinersGallery.com. Airbus A340-541 9V-SGE (msn 563) exits the runway at Los Angeles International Airport.

Singapore Airlines:

Lufthansa to start Munich-Mexico City service

Lufthansa (Frankfurt) will launch a new route linking its Munich hub and Mexico City in April. The new route will be operated five days a week with Airbus A340-600s.

In other news, Lufthansa has stopped its humorous Swedish ad campaign for contestants to change their name to the gender-confusing “Klaus-Heidi” in return for a new life in popular destination of Berlin. 38 Swedes signed up in the contest for the false name change promotion before the airline decided to stop the ad campaign according to this report by RT.

Read the full report: CLICK HERE

Lufthansa has had a long tradition of naming its aircraft after cities. In this report by Lufthansa, the airline explains how it choses the aircraft names:

Lufthansa has been carrying the names of German cities around the world for over 50 years

An Lufthansa Airbus A319 is about to begin its life as a “flying ambassador” under the name of “Herborn.” On October 29, 2013, the jet with the registration D-AIBH was officially named “Herborn” at Frankfurt Airport by Ursula Benner, wife of the mayor. In accordance with the convention for Lufthansa aircraft naming ceremonies, Herborn’s Mayor Hans Benner then revealed the name on the fuselage and signed the naming certificate together with Karl Ulrich Garnadt, CEO and Chairman of the Executive Board of Lufthansa Cargo AG.

Lufthansa naming conventions as a sign of our time

The “Herborn” brings the total number of aircraft named after German cities and states to over 300. This naming convention has a long tradition at Lufthansa. The first Lufthansa aircraft was named in 1960 (see inset). The idea was to express the company’s solidarity with its German homeland – not just with the major hubs and cities but also with the regions where a large portion of Lufthansa passengers and employees come from.

But 50 years later, the airline operates a much larger network. The increasing number of passengers from all over the world share a key Lufthansa characteristic – internationality. This is why the Airbus A380 will also bear the names of major international cities such as Beijing, Zurich and Johannesburg.

The size of the waiting list is a clear sign that there is still great interest in aircraft naming – even after 50 years. Lufthansa currently holds applications from 245 interested cities and the demand has led to extended waiting times of between 10 and 15 years. The name of your city on the body of a Lufthansa aircraft is still a desirable symbol.

The choice of partner cities – not an easy decision

When choosing names, Lufthansa is guided by the historical, social and economic relevance of the place. Cities may be considered if they have a special connection with aviation or with Lufthansa.

Size, on the other hand, is unimportant. Nevertheless, when choosing names, Lufthansa generally tries to match the population of the place to the size of the aircraft. A Boeing 747-8 carries the name “Brandenburg,” for example, and an Airbus A321 carries the name “Stade” all over the world.

So what happens when an aircraft is taken out of service? The towns and cities in question can relax, because aircraft naming has become an enduring tradition at Lufthansa. In other words, once a town has been accepted into the inner circle and had an aircraft named after it, the name is transferred to a new aircraft when the old one is taken out of the Lufthansa fleet. The motto is “Once Lufthansa, always Lufthansa.”

The history of the “Berlin,” 1960 to present.

The tradition of aircraft naming began on September 16, 1960 with the naming of the “Berlin” by the then mayor, Willy Brandt, who was later to become Chancellor of Germany. Five years after the refounding of the airline with its “crane” symbol, a Lufthansa aircraft began taking the name of a German city to all parts of the world. Over the next fifty years, the name “Berlin” would be passed on to five modern wide-bodied aircraft. At the present time an Airbus A380 bears the name of the German capital. The Lufthansa flagship was named at Berlin Tegel Airport by the mayor, Klaus Wowereit, in 2012. The “Berlin” now flies under the call sign “Mike India” along the east and west coasts of North America and to major cities in the Far East.

Top Copyright Photo: Paul Bannwarth/AirlinersGallery.com (all others by Lufthansa). Airbus A340-642 D-AIHE (msn 540) arrives at the Frankfurt hub.

Lufthansa:

Norwegian wants Boeing to repair a defective 787

Norwegian Air Shuttle (Norwegian.com) (Oslo) is demanding repairs from Boeing on a newly delivered Boeing 787-8 after the 787 suffered repeated maintenance breakdowns according to this report by Reuters.

Norwegian Long Haul will again lease an Airbus A340 from Hifly to maintain its schedules and will not take re-delivery of the 787 until it is more reliable according to the report.

Meanwhile Boeing is stationing a 787 repair crew in Stockholm, Sweden to handle any maintenance issues. The broken 787 is still located in Bangkok, Thailand.

Read the full report: CLICK HERE

For the 787 to be a successful airliner, it must be reliable. Right now that is in question. For small, but fast-growing carriers like Norwegian, reliability is paramount as it does not have the luxury of a spare aircraft when one breaks, in this case often.

Read the analysis of the problem by Reuters: CLICK HERE

Copyright Photo: Kok Chwee K.C. Sim/AirlinersGallery.com. Norwegian is again leasing an Airbus A340 from Hifly to fill the gap while the 787 is repaired. On the first round when the 787 delivery was delayed, the pictured Hifly A340-313X CS-TQY (msn 190) wore a red norwegian.com banner on the lower fuselage.

Norwegian: