It’s been another busy week for new flights.
Southwest Airlines has announced expanded service to Hawaii starting in mid-January 2020. The airline will run new daily service between Sacramento and Honolulu, as well as new nonstop service from both of the carrier’s Hawaii gateways in the Bay Area, Oakland and San Jose, to both Kauai and Hawaii Island. All told, the schedule update gives travelers on Southwest access to 18 transpacific flights between three California cities and four of the five airports Southwest will serve in the Aloha State. Bookings for flights through March 6, 2020, are now available.
In Europe, Delta and Virgin Atlantic announced additional flights between the United States and the UK for their summer 2020 schedule, representing a 15 percent increase in capacity. Starting March 28, 2020, Delta will increase its JFK-Heathrow services to three daily year-round frequencies, with Virgin Atlantic operating five, maintaining an eight-flights-daily schedule. The new Delta frequency will mark the airline’s first-ever daylight transatlantic flight and will complement the existing daylight service offered by Virgin Atlantic, Delta said. Starting this winter, all of Delta’s JFK and Boston-Heathrow flights will operate on its newly retrofitted Boeing 767-400 aircraft.
On March 29, 2020, Virgin Atlantic will launch three additional weekly flights from Los Angeles to Heathrow, for a total of 17 weekly frequencies, and four additional weekly Seattle – Heathrow flights, for a total of 11. LA will also be the second Virgin Atlantic destination to receive the airline’s new A350, from next year, while the additional frequencies from Seattle will be operated by Boeing 787.
Delta also announced plans to return to London Gatwick alongside Virgin Atlantic with new services from Boston and New York-JFK effective May 21, 2020. Gatwick will become the seventh transatlantic destination served nonstop by Delta from Boston, while flights from New York-JFK will be operated by Virgin Atlantic. Delta is also set to return to Manchester with new peak-summer service from Boston effective May 21, 2020. Manchester will become the eighth transatlantic destination served nonstop by Delta from Boston, while flights from Atlanta, New York-JFK, Las Vegas, Los Angeles and Orlando will continue to be operated by Virgin Atlantic.
Finally, TAP Air Portugal announced plans to add 15 flights weekly from the United States and Canada as part of its summer 2020 schedule. From June 2020, TAP will serve the New York market with four daily roundtrips to Portugal. The airline will add a second daily flight between New York - JFK, plus an extra weekly flight to its Newark-Porto service, making that a daily operation, along with the existing daily Newark-Lisbon service.
TAP will add two weekly Miami-Lisbon flights this winter and a third next summer for a weekly total of 10 roundtrips. The airline is also adding two weekly frequencies to the Chicago-Lisbon, and Washington, DC-Lisbon routes, making each daily service.
TAP also serves both Boston-Lisbon and Toronto-Lisbon daily, and San Francisco-Lisbon with five flights weekly.
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