Emirates Australia to the Toon direct

Middle Eastern carrier Emirates is confident there is sufficient demand to fill the extra planes it will fly to Australia over the next four years as it significantly increases capacity and poses a new competitive threat to Qantas.
But the Dubai-based powerhouse says when and where it will expand will depend in the near term on the availability of aircraft.
Emirates senior vice-president of commercial operations in East Asia and Australasia Richard Vaughan said yesterday that the airline’s planning department was looking at how, when and where it would increase services after being allowed by the federal Government to boost its flights by 71 per cent, from 49 flights a week to 84 a week, by 2011.

The extra capacity will eventually enable Emirates to fly three services a day to the four biggest capital cities.

But the airline, like its competitors, is battling a tight aircraft market in the wake of delays to the Airbus A380 superjumbo and an ongoing industry expansion.

“Every flight that comes down to Australia is basically two and a half aircraft and with two and a half aircraft you’ve got basically 30 crew,” he said.

“So it’s a planning exercise really. The market’s there without a doubt but unfortunately it’s one of those things you can’t plan for until you know what you’re going to get.”

Mr Vaughan said that with twice-daily services to Sydney, Melbourne and Perth, the next logical alternative for additional flights was Brisbane. But he cautioned that no decision could be made until the aircraft situation was clarified.

“People are scrambling for aircraft,” he said. “Even with one a month arriving for the next five years, the A380 has really played havoc with forward planning.”

The Emirates executive said the A380 would fit well on Australian routes, and destinations here were likely to have a high priority when decisions were made ahead of the plane’s delivery next year.

He was confident there was enough market demand to fill extra seats created by Emirates’ boosted services. “You’ll remember that the original plan was up to 2014 with basically four (daily services) to each point,” he said.

“And that was done on pretty solid data that we had.

“Basically they’ve pulled it back three years.”

Emirates also looks set to increase pressure on the kangaroo route with a series of one-stop options that allow passengers to fly directly to provincial British cities without transiting through London’s Heathrow.

Mr Vaughan said British destinations remained strong on Australian routes with the northeastern industrial city of Newcastle due to become the airline’s latest provincial destination.
Middle Eastern traffic was also rising as Australia’s profile in the region increased, with Australia-New Zealand packages proving popular and more than 17,000 people heading for the Gold Coast from Dubai last July and August. He also said New York was working for the airline out of Perth.

“This is what’s good for Australia – the direct connections we’ve got from Africa, from other points in the Middle East and from Europe and the US,” Mr Vaughan said.

Meanwhile, sources close to the Qantas takeover bid were still unable to confirm yesterday that a deal had been done with the banks that are funding the consortium, Airline Partners Australia, to ease restrictions on the deal.

A source said he would be surprised if there was any announcement on a bank deal today. However, APA will have to disclose to the market by Thursday whether it intends to extend the bid.