After much huffing and puffing, denials, it appears Qatar Airways is finally joining oneworld.
Its membership status is member elect as it prepares to joying the alliance, with a time-frame to full membership in 12-18 months. British Airways will be mentoring Qatar Airways transition into oneworld.
Qatar is the first of the big three Gulf Airlines to make an actual membership join as opposed to Emirates (who like to codeshare) and Etihad (who likes to buy and codeshare). oneworld already has Royal Jordan as a member airline in the region, with Skyteam have Saudia in their alliance. Star Alliance are conspicuous by their absence.
oneworld will add 15 new destinations and three countries – – Iran, Rwanda and the Seychelles -to their network, whilst giving oneworld a big Gulf hub with access to one hell of 1 stop hub.
Qatar Airways operates one of the world’s youngest and most modern fleets, currently standing at 111 Boeing and Airbus aircraft, with a oneworld fleet of 2600 aircraft operating to 856 destinations in 159 countries,
For frequent flyers, when Qatar airways completes joining oneworld expect the usual lounge access, mileage earning, and all the fun as usual.
The PR is at http://www.oneworld.com/news-information/oneworldnews/details/?objectID=52692… and it makes… well. Some reading I suppose.
An interesting turn. Looks like I’m going to have to publish the article I half wrote last week on what Gulf regional airlines….