British Airways today resumed flights to Johannesburg, Cape Town and Bahrain, part of a number restored routes as it steps up its network this month after suspending a swathe of services during the global pandemic.
The resumption of the South African services today comes after the country re-opened this month for international flights. Lufthansa was among other international carriers to resume South African services.
Ironically the reopening of the country to international flights comes a day after national carrier South African Airways suspended all airline operations while its business rescuers assess options to obtain urgent funding
BA is also adding back flights to long-haul winter sun destinations Grenada, Barbados, the Seychelles and the Maldives later in October. These join the airline’s new Heathrow service to Lahore in Pakistan.
The airline has also bolstered its short-haul network. Flights to Brussels, Dublin, Dusseldorf, Gothenburg, Milan Linate, Stuttgart, Seville and Valencia returned today, while it will resume Bilbao, Kefalonia, Luxembourg and Lanzarote over the next two days.
Later in the month, BA will resume flights to Basel, Billund, Bordeaux, Brindisi, Grand Canaria, Cologne, Malta, Salzburg, Vienna and Zagreb.
BA director of network and alliances, Neil Chernoff, says: “We’re glad to be returning to more destinations this month, connecting the UK with more and more countries around the world.”
Cirium schedules data shows BA is set to operate more than 5,300 return flights on international routes during October, compared to a little over 3,000 in September. But this remains less than half the roughly 12,300 international return flights the UK carrier operated a year ago.
