Wizz Air yesterday completed its first flight to Abu Dhabi. The European low-cost carrier is planning to open a new subsidiary in the United Arab Emirates' capital city in the next few months. Wizz Air is eying 100 aircraft based in Abu Dhabi by the end of 2035.

Airlines around the world have been suffering from the impacts of the world's worst-ever aviation crisis. However, so far, Wizz Air has been mostly unaffected. While airlines had been scrambling to cut services to save cash, the purple LCC was adding bases and routes left, right, and center. Now, they've inaugurated their new Abu Dhabi route.

Abu Dhabi inauguration

Today was a special day for Wizz Air. While the carrier is one day hoping to have a massive operation out of Abu Dhabi, it is starting with small steps. Yesterday was the smallest, but the first step nonetheless. The airline operated its first flight to the capital of the United Arab Emirates.

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The airline's first Abu Dhabi flight departed from its home base, Budapest, at 11:49 in the morning, 19 minutes behind schedule. The trip was operated by an A320 (HA-LWR) and lasted around five hours, not too long to be stuck inside a narrowbody.

After the five-hour and four-minute flight, the Airbus A320 landed in Abu Dhabi at 18:53 local time. Despite the 19 minute delay in departure, the aircraft landed 17 minutes early. Wizz has scheduled a 45-minute turnaround on the ground in Abu Dhabi. However, yesterday the inaugural flight remained at the airport for one hour and 19 minutes.

Commenting, George Michalopoulos, Chief Commercial Officer of Wizz Air said,

“I am delighted to celebrate the first scheduled Wizz Air flight to Abu Dhabi. Wizz Air is committed to growing the airline’s network to the capital of the United Arab Emirates... Wizz Air’s ultra-low fares and route network will contribute to the further growth of Abu Dhabi’s tourism sector.”

More flights to come

Over the coming months before launching its Abu Dhabi based subsidiary, Wizz Air will continue to build its operation in Abu Dhabi slowly. For the remainder of July, the airline will operate four services per week to the city. Two from Budapest, and two from Bucharest.

There will then be a slight delay in launching further routes, with the next three launches planned for September. The new routes will each operate two times per week, meaning that Wizz will operate ten weekly flights to Abu Dhabi. The new September routes are:

• Cluj-Napoca
• Katowice
• Sofia

We're still eagerly awaiting details of when Wizz's Abu Dhabi subsidiary will be launched. In April, we heard that the airline planned to fast forward the subsidiary's launch to before this autumn. If this is the case, we could see many more routes before the next three in September.

What do you make of Wizz's first Abu Dhabi service? Let us know your thoughts in the comments!