Emirates Goes Up To 21 Flights A Week, Plans More

Emirates Goes Up To 21 Flights A Week, Plans More

Emirates, the Dubai-based international airline, increased its New Zealand frequency to 21 flights a week today, and declared its intention to expand further.

"The start-up of daily flights through Brisbane today, in addition to the existing daily flights through Sydney and Melbourne, is another important step for Emirates as we firmly establish ourselves in the New Zealand market," said airline president Tim Clark.

"Inauguration of services to Brisbane is very important in us being able to offer regular flights to key cities in Australia and beyond. Queensland is a favourite destination for New Zealanders, and the new service also offers long-haul travellers the choice of three routes to Dubai and other destinations such as Europe and Africa," he said.

"We see scope for further expansion, and hope to say more about this before too long," added Mr Clark.

Brisbane becomes Emirates' 71st destination in 50 countries.

With the new service, Emirates now offers more than 1000 seats a day in each direction on the Tasman. Emirates SkyCargo has more than 60 tonnes of cargo space in each direction daily.

The daily Brisbane flight will initially be operated by Airbus A330-200 aircraft, changing to Boeing 777 from December.

The flight schedule (all times local) is:

Inbound:

Flight EK430 departs Dubai at 8.25am, arriving at Singapore at 7.50pm and departing again for Brisbane at 9pm. After arriving at Brisbane at 6.25am the following morning it leaves for Auckland at 7.50am, landing in Auckland at 1.55pm.

Outbound:

Flight EK431 departs Auckland at 6.25pm, arriving in Brisbane at 6.55pm. The flight then departs Brisbane at 8.05pm, arriving in Singapore at 2am the following morning, before leaving for Dubai at 3.15am. The service lands in Dubai at 6.40am.

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