Canberra to probe veto of Qatar Airways’ Australia flights
08.09.2023 – 01:53 UTC
The Australian government will run a parliamentary inquiry into a decision to prevent Qatar Airways (QR, Doha Hamad International) from accessing additional landing rights at key Australian airports. The inquiry, which the Liberal National Opposition Party proposed, made it through the Senate approvals process this week by a single vote.
The current air services agreement allows Qatar Airways to operate a maximum of 28 roundtrips a week into Sydney Kingsford Smith, Melbourne Tullamarine, Brisbane International, and Perth International Airports. Based on a single daily roundtrip into each airport, this allocation is currently at capacity. There are no caps on flights to other Australian airports. Qatar Airways had requested to go double daily into Melbourne, Sydney, and Brisbane – an additional 21 roundtrips per week. The proposal was widely supported by the tourism and travel industry, which say extra capacity into Australia is badly needed. The airline had also generated considerable goodwill by maintaining services to Australia during the pandemic when many others, including the local flag carrier Qantas (QF, Sydney Kingsford Smith…
Tata, Adani, Emirates vie for SriLankan Airlines – report
06.09.2023 – 02:19 UTC
The Sri Lankan government is in talks with many private companies and airlines as it prepares to privatise SriLankan Airlines (UL, Colombo International), including Emirates (EK, Dubai International) and the Indian conglomerates Tata Sons and Adani Group, according to Veeraperumal Ravindran, the carrier’s regional manager for India, Bangladesh, and Nepal.
Ravindran was speaking to the Indian broadsheet The New Indian Express to raise the airline’s profile in the Indian state of Kerala, where it is planning to increase its frequencies between Colombo and Thiruvananthapuram in the coming winter schedules from 6x to 7x weekly and to maintain its 10x weekly frequencies to Kochi International. It also plans to start flights to Kozhikode given the availability of aircraft.
There has been a steep rise in traffic from India to Sri Lanka in the last seven months, he said, adding that business at the airline is picking up as “things are becoming more normal in Sri Lanka”. However, he said nothing more about the privatisation.
As ch-aviation has previously reported,…
Maldives’ BeOnd details initial network from mid-4Q23
05.09.2023 – 12:27 UTC
BeOnd (Malé) will launch in mid-November 2023 with an A319-100 flying the Munich – Malé, Zurich – Malé, and Riyadh – Malé city pairs.
Speaking to the media on September 5, CEO Tero Taskila said a 44-seat A319-100 would initially fly twice weekly from Malé to Riyadh from November 9, twice weekly from Munich from November 15, and twice weekly from Zurich from November 17. BeOnd will launch with the single aircraft but plans to induct an A321-200 over the upcoming Northern Hemisphere winter.
Taskila is confident that tickets, now on sale, will sell out quickly owing to limited capacity. “Luxury travel is the fastest growing travel segment in the world, and BeOnd is the world’s first premium leisure airline,” said the CEO. “We are focusing on leisure travel only.”
BeOnd founder Max Nilov told ch-aviation that BeOnd’s strategy centres on operating aircraft from a single family type, namely the A320 family. He hosed down previous talk of acquiring widebodies, including A330-900Ns. “Our strategy is to…
Flight row fuels Qatar Airways, Virgin Australia rumours
31.08.2023 – 03:14 UTC
Speculation is mounting that Qatar Airways (QR, Doha Hamad International) is weighing a stake in the airline amid a row over Canberra’s decision to turn down the Qatari carrier’s request for more flights to Australia.
Reports and rumours that Qatar Airways has been considering investing in Virgin Australia have circulated for some time, but there’s been no definitive confirmation of their interest at this time, although insiders informed ch-aviation that the reporting on this issue was purely speculation and not necessarily accurate.
Virgin Australia declined to comment and Qatar Airways was not immediately available.
Virgin Australia plans an initial public offering (IPO) on the Australian Stock Exchange (ASX) in November this year. The airline delisted after US investor Bain Capital acquired 93% of the airline in 2020 after it was placed in voluntary administration.
Meanwhile, Virgin Australia has come out in defence of its codeshare partner Qatar Airways before an August 28 Senate committee where Chief Executive Officer Jayne Hrdlicka called on the federal government to reconsider its decision last month to…
Editorial Comment: Updated with Virgin Australia’s no comment. – 31.08.2023 – 10:44 UTC