As Australia’s international border restrictions are lifted, Qantas has quietly announced that it will resume flights to six overseas locations, including a handful of extra trips from Brisbane.
It comes after Prime Minister Scott Morrison stated that Australia’s borders will reopen to fully vaccinated tourists and visa holders on February 21, marking the first time the country’s international border restrictions have been entirely removed since they were implemented in March 2020.
The Flying Kangaroo will resume its Sydney-Dallas Fort Worth route as QF7, with the return leg as QF8, starting this week. Both flights will be operated by Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner aircraft.
According to FlightAware, the last time Qantas flew QF7 was on March 25, 2020, and the last time Qantas flew QF8 was the next day.
Then, starting on March 27, Qantas will restart its Brisbane-Singapore, Sydney-Manila, and Sydney-Jakarta routes, followed by Sydney-Denpasar (Bali) flights the following day, as previously announced.
From April 1, Qantas plans to resume daily flights between Brisbane and Los Angeles on its Airbus A330 aircraft.
The news comes after Qantas Domestic and International CEO Andrew David reported that inbound airline bookings to Australia increased in one day after the Prime Minister announced the border.
“Bookings are strongest out of the US and UK, and we’ve also seen spikes from South Africa, India, and Canada, with March, April, and May the most popular months for travel,” he said.
“This shows how much people want to come to Australia.”
It comes after Emirates, a Dubai-based airline, announced on March 1 that it will increase its capacity on the Dubai-Sydney route, increasing to two return flights per day on its renowned Airbus A380 aircraft.
With the extra flights, Emirates will be able to bring over 1,000 people into Sydney every day.
After resuming daily A380 services to Sydney in December, Emirates announced earlier this month that it had also restored A380 services to and from Melbourne, replacing its Boeing 777-300ER on daily flights between Melbourne and Dubai.
Meanwhile, British Airways confirmed this week that, following a two-year hiatus due to the pandemic, it will resume service on its Sydney to London route in March.
The first flight, BA15, is set to arrive in Sydney on March 29 and will operate five times each week thereafter.
From April 1, the airline announced, services will be increased to daily.
According to the timetable, all services will be operated on a Boeing 787-9 or a Boeing 777-300(ER) aircraft.
