British Airways Logo (Image Credit: British Airways)
British Airways has announced the launch of a new route from London Heathrow to the Danish town of Billund (Billund International Airport) from Tuesday 3 May 2016.
The airline will fly to the town that is famous for being the headquarters of Lego and the home of LEGOLAND Billund Resort 11 times a week from London Heathrow Terminal 5.
Flights will operate using a mixture of Airbus A319 and A320 aircraft with a two class Club Europe business class and EuroTraveller economy service.
BA’s franchise partner SUN-AIR of Scandinavia will continue to fly from London City to Billund using a Dornier 328 jet.
British Airways Short Haul Economy Cabin (Credit: British Airways)
British Airways continues its successful strategy of summer seasonal routes from London Heathrow with the launch of there new routes from 2016: Biarritz in South West France, Mahon on the island of Menorca and Palermo, the capital of Sciliy.
The airline will fly two times a week to Biarritz from Sunday 1 May, four times a week to Menorca from Friday 29 April 2016 and two times a week to Palermo from Saturday 30 April 2016.
All flights will depart from London Heathrow Terminal 5. Flights are on sale now at ba.com
London Heathrow – Biarritz (Biarritz Pay-Basque airport)
Qatar Airways aircraft in Oneworld livery (Image Credit: Oneworld)
If there’s one route from London where travellers have an unrivalled choice of routes and airlines, it has to be London – Sydney.
Sydney is a destination that cannot be reached non-stop from London requiring a stop-over en route (hence the name the “The Kangaroo Route”).
Not long ago, it was typically a choice of a stop-over in Singapore or Bangkok. Now there is not only a vast choice of stop-overs in Asia, but also the Middle East with Emirates in particular soaking up significant volumes of traffic between Europe and Australia.
Qatar Airways is one of the Middle Eastern airlines that, to date, has not served Sydney. However, a relaxation of the bilateral treaty that governs flights between Qatar and Australia has allowed Qatar Airways to launch a new route from Doha to Sydney from Tuesday 1 March 2016.
Flights will be operated with a two class Boeing 777 aircraft and are well timed for connections to and from London Heathrow. The early evening arrival in Sydney will be welcome to those who prefer to avoid an early morning arrival.
Virgin Atlantic’s “Little Red” short-haul airline which operated flights between London Heathrow, Manchester, Edinburgh and Aberdeen using aircraft and crews leased from Aer Lingus has ended operations as of Saturday 26 September 2015.
Airbus A320 aircraft in Virgin Atlantic “Little Red” livery
Virgin Atlantic’s short-lived “Little Red” UK domestic network has now closed. Virgin Atlantic has now reverted back to being an exclusively long-haul airline.
Little Red’s last flight was VS3025 from Aberdeen to London Heathrow late on Saturday 26 September 2015.
The short-lived subsidiary operation of Virgin Atlantic, lasting a little over two years, flew between London Heathrow and Manchester, Edinburgh and Aberdeen.
It was born partly out of the requirement for British Airways to make slots available to competitors as a condition of the takeover of bmi British Midland by its parent company, International Airlines Group.
In the absence of any alternative airline coming forward to bid for the slots, the slot pairs forfeited by British Airways will now revert back to the airline.
This leaves British Airways as the sole operator of UK domestic flights from the North of England and Scotland to London Heathrow.
In terms of the impact of the closure of Little Red on connectivity to London Heathrow, British Airways is required to make seats available on its UK domestic network got connections to Virgin Atlantic and other airlines which codeshared with Virgin Atlantic Little Red such as United Airlines and Air New Zealand.
Ocean Beach, San Diego (Image Credit: London Air Travel)
British Airways has announced it is to upgrade its London Heathrow – San Diego route from a three class Boeing 777-200 aircraft to a four class Boeing 777-300 aircraft from Sunday 27 March 2016.
This is a significant upgrade for the London Heathrow – San Diego route, which will celebrate its fifth anniversary in June 2016.
BA will be offering First Class on this route for the first time since the route was reinstated as a direct route from London Heathrow and continues a trend of first class being added to routes, such as Austin and Denver.
Although, the overall number of seats on each flight will only increase from 275 to 299, there is a significant change in the profile of premium seating with the addition of 14 First Class seats, 8 additional Club World business class seats and 20 additional World Traveller Plus premium economy seats.
Passengers in all cabins will also benefit from a much better in flight entertainment system which is more stable and features much more content. The seats in all cabins also have in-seat power sockets and a USB/RCA socket, enabling personal devices to be connected to the in flight entertainment system.
Update: BA has since changed the aircraft operating this route to a Boeing 747.
This route will be the only direct link between San Jose, California and Europe. It is consistent with the airline opening new North American destinations that are not served by any other European airline. It is also the second new BA route after Austin, Texas to use the Boeing 787 Dreamliner from launch.
San Jose will be the fourth city in California to be served by British Airways after Los Angeles, San Francisco and San Diego. It is also one of a growing number of new transatlantic routes from London Heathrow following the launch of Salt Lake City by Delta.
BA’s four class Boeing 787-900 Dreamliner will feature 8 first class seats, 42 Club World business class seats, 39 World Traveller Plus premium economy seats and 127 World Traveller economy seats.
The Boeing 787-900 Dreamliner will debut on BA on London Heathrow – Dehli from 25 October 2015. The Club World business class and World Traveller Plus cabins will be as found on the current Boeing 787-800 Dreamliner. The World Traveller economy seat will be slightly wider and the First Class seat is expected to be a modified version of BA’s current First Class seat.
Flights will go on sale at ba.com from Thursday 27 August 2015. The route can also be booked as a codeshare with American Airlines.
Based on the performance of other new BA transatlantic routes from London Heathrow in recent years (Las Vegas, San Diego and Austin) we expect it will perform strongly.
BA has also produced a PDF brochure for the new route.
London Heathrow – San Jose, California
Flight BA279 Depart London Heathrow 15:15 – Arrive San Jose 18:05
Flight BA278 Depart San Jose 20:00 – Arrive London Heathrow 14:05
(Timetable is at launch, and may subsequently vary by season.)
Delta at London Heathrow (Image Credit: London Heathrow)
Delta Air Lines continues its steady transatlantic growth at London Heathrow with the launch a new route to Salt Lake City in Utah from Sunday 1 May 2016.
The flight will operate on a summer seasonal basis. This will be the only direct flight from London Heathrow to Utah. Delta will also offer passengers connections to some 50 cities from Salt Lake City.
Flights will be operated with a Boeing 767-300 aircraft, with a two class, business & economy, service. Flights will depart from London Heathrow Terminal 3. It is codeshared with Delta’s transatlantic joint-venture partner, Virgin Atlantic.
Flight DL 51/VS 4019 – Depart London Heathrow 10:10 – Arrive Salt Lake City 13:07
Flight DL 50/VS 4020 – Depart Salt Lake City 16:52 – Arrive London Heathrow 10:00
Update March 2018
This route is scheduled to return on Tuesday 1 May 2018 and will operate until Saturday 27 October 2018. Flights will operate daily for most of the season.
British Airways Airbus A380 at take off, London Heathrow (Image Credit: Heathrow)
Vancouver is to join BA’s roster of Airbus A380 destinations from 1 May 2016 until 2 October 2016 as one of its daily flights to the Canadian city will be upgraded from a Boeing 747 to an Airbus A380:
Flight BA085 Depart London Heathrow 17:15 – Arrive Vancouver 18:40
Flight BA084 Depart Vancouver 20:50 – Arrive London Heathrow 14:00
This does mark the end of, temporarily at least, BA Boeing 747 services to Vancouver. The service will revert back to a daily Boeing 747 from 2 October 2016. There is no doubt that the Airbus A380 is a significant upgrade over the Boeing 747 in all aspects, particularly with regard to seating in World Traveller Plus, in-flight entertainment aircraft condition and overall cabin comfort.
Other BA A380 destinations include selected flights to Los Angeles, Washington, Johannesburg, Hong Kong, Singapore, San Francisco and, from 25 October 2015, Miami.
For passengers looking to book specific A380 services we should note that schedules are subject to change and aircraft can also be substituted at short notice.
Update January 2018:
The Airbus A380 is next due to operate on this route from Tuesday 1 May 2018 to Sunday 30 September 2018. The route continues to otherwise operates with a Boeing 747.
British Airways Logo (Image Credit: British Airways)
British Airways has announced it is to suspend its thrice weekly flight from London Heathrow to Almaty in Kazakhstan from Sunday 11 October 2015.
The last flight (BA159) will depart from London Heathrow to Almaty on Sunday 11 October 2015. The last flight from Almaty to London Heathrow (BA158) will depart on Monday 12 October 2015.
This means London will lose a direct link to Kazakhstan.
The airline has cited commercial reasons for the suspension of the route. This route was inherited from the merger of bmi into British Airways in 2012. It joins a long list of former bmi Heathrow routes suspended by BA (Damascus, Addis Ababa, Dammam, Bishkek, Khartoum, Tehran, Yerevan, Amristar, Casablanca, Marrakech and Tbilisi).
Currently, affected passengers have the option of a full refund or taking an earlier flight whilst the route is still operational.
BA do say they are looking at re-accommodation options on other airlines. It normally takes at least a couple of weeks for these to be announced and we would advise waiting before taking any action.
Passengers looking at alternative options have the option of Lufthansa (via Frankfurt) and Turkish Airlines (via Istanbul). There are other options with lesser known airlines and hubs.
Update 28 July: BA is now offering affected passengers the option of a re-route on Etihad Airways via Abu Dhabi up to 15 July 2016. Passengers should contact either their travel agent or BA directly to change their tickets.
British Airways Logo (Image Credit: British Airways)
British Airways has announced it is to suspend its four times weekly flight from London Heathrow to Entebbe in Uganda from 2 October 2015.
The last flight (BA63) will depart from London Heathrow to Entebbe on 2 October 2015. The last flight from Entebbe to London Heathrow (BA62) will depart on 3 October 2015.
This means that London Heathrow will not have a direct link to Entebbe after the route has been suspended.
The airline has cited commercial reasons for the suspension of the route. It is likely that competitive pressure from Middle Eastern carriers are a factor. BA suspended Lusaka in 2013 and Dar es Salaam in 2012.
Currently, affected passengers have the option of a full refund, taking an earlier flight whilst the route is still operational, or taking an alternative BA flight to Nairobi (BA will not meet any onward travel expenses).
BA do say they are looking at re-accommodation options on other airlines. It normally takes at least a couple of weeks for these to be announced and we would advise waiting before taking any action.
For passengers looking at alternative routes, options include KLM (via Amsterdam), Brussels Airlines (via Brussels), Emirates (via Dubai), Qatar Airways (via Doha), Etihad (via Abu Dhabi), Turkish Airlines (via Istabul).
Update 28 July: BA is now offering affected passengers the option of a re-route on either Etihad Airways via Abu Dhabi or Brussels Airlines via Brussels up to 15 July 2016. Passengers should contact either their travel agent or BA directly to change their tickets.
