Whilst there are thoughts of summer in a lot of people’s minds, airlines are deep into planning winter and next year.
Virgin Atlantic is trying a new route out of Manchester – with a new service to Delhi for the winter.
Virgin Atlantic Airbus A330 at London Heathrow – Image, Economy Class and Beyond
The service is due to commence on 26th October, with a three times a week service.
Planes operation is as follows
VS318 DEPART MAN 16:40 ARRIVE DEL 06:05+1 VS319 DEPART DEL 08:10 ARRIVE MAN 12:10 Commences 26th October 2020 VS318 will operate Monday's, Thursdays and Saturday's VS319 will operate Tuesdays, Fridays and Sunday's. Booked Equipment: Airbus A330-200.
Lead-in fares start at £535 return, with flights on sale from the 3rd March. The additional flight to Delhi will allow Virgin Atlantic to offer 600,000 seats a year between the two countries
The airline has also made additional capacity improvements to Barbados – with a daily flight from Gatwick, a seasonal service from Heathrow and a Boeing 747 operating three times a week from Manchester.
Havana gets an uplift of one extra service a week
In quotes
Juha Jarvinen, Chief Commercial Officer, Virgin Atlantic commented:
“2020 is an extremely exciting year of continued growth for Virgin Atlantic and increasing our presence out of Manchester is a huge focus for us. Not only are we the headline sponsor of the Manchester Pride Festival but we’re delighted to announce a new service flying three times a week from Manchester to Delhi, additional capacity into Barbados from Manchester as well as a Clubhouse opening this summer. This year will also see Flybe transform into Virgin Connect, and we’re excited to offer customers flying from the north 47 daily flights throughout the UK, Ireland and across Europe.”
“2020 marks our 20th anniversary of flying to India and as the destination continues to grow in popularity for both business and leisure travel, we’re thrilled to fly to Delhi for very first time from Manchester, our home in the north. Additionally, we look forward launching new services from Heathrow to Sao Paulo and Cape Town as well as increasing capacity on our Heathrow to Havana route.”
A measured growth.
It’s taken some time after the great retreat of 2106, but Virgin Atlantic is at last growing against – and beyond North America.
Virgin Atlantic not be competing with any other airline on the route – so it will be interesting to see if Air India chooses this as the ideal time to return to Manchester (the airline gave up the route some years ago).
Currently, Air India serves London Heathrow, London Stansted and Birmingham Airport.
The addition service to India is an interesting move by Virgin Atlantic – and one that will be watched by its competitors…
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