Emirates Enhancing Nz-London A380 Service

News Release, 16 December 2011

Emirates Enhancing Nz-London A380 Service

Emirates will become by far London Heathrow’s largest A380 superjumbo operator in 2012 with four of the double-decker aircraft to serve the airport daily.

The airline already has double daily A380 service from Dubai to Heathrow, the earliest of which provides direct connections with all four of Emirates’ daily flights from New Zealand to Dubai. The increase in A380 frequency means that Emirates will be the only airline offering direct A380 services all the way between New Zealand and London in both directions.

Following last month’s announcement of a third Heathrow daily A380 flight from January 24, 2012, Emirates will launch a fourth A380 service from March 25 next year.

The deployment means four of Emirates’ five daily Heathrow flights will be served by the A380 – twice as many as any other carrier.

“This demonstrates the beauty of the A380 – its ability to increase our service to our passengers in style, and without adding traffic to London Heathrow’s busy schedule,” said Salem Obaidalla, Emirates’ Senior Vice President, Commercial Operations, Europe & Russian Federation. “We would like to acknowledge the support and cooperation of the Heathrow authorities in bringing a fourth A380 to the British capital.”

From March 25, Emirates will offer the following New Zealand-London all-A380 services:

Depart Auckland 6.40pm, arrive Dubai 5.30am (following day); depart Dubai 7.45am, arrive Heathrow 12.15pm.

Depart Heathrow 10.15pm, arrive Dubai 8.05am (following day); depart Dubai 10.15am, arrive Auckland 1pm (following day).

Emirates also offers A380 flights from Auckland via Dubai right through to Manchester, Paris, Munich and Rome.

The Emirates’ A380s serving Auckland offer 14 flat-bed First Class Private Suites with electrically operated doors and 76 fully-flat mini-pods in Business Class - all with aisle access - on the upper deck. Downstairs, there are 399 comfortable contoured seats in Economy Class, spread across four separate cabins.

Passengers in all classes have a choice of over 1200 channels of films, television programmes, music and games carried on the ‘ice’ entertainment system.

A personal satellite phone is fitted to each seat, which also carries a seat-back sms and email service, along with seat to seat calling and a "My USB" personal picture viewing facility.

-ends

© Scoop Media