Emirates is doubling down on its A380 service to New York's JFK airport. From Monday next week, the Middle Eastern airline will add a second A380 service to its existing EK201/202 rotation, replacing the 777 on EK203 and 204 with the superjumbo. The move comes as the airline looks to up its capacity and frequencies on its most in-demand routes.
Emirates is going bigger to New York
Middle Eastern giant Emirates is going bigger on its Dubai to JFK service. From Monday next week, August 16th, the airline will fly the superjumbo on more of its rotations to the US hub.
The A380 will replace the 777 on flight EK203, a four times a week service from Dubai to New York. The paired return flight, EK204, will also move to an A380 service from next week. Outbound, flights leave Dubai at 02:50, to arrive in New York at 08:50 the same day. Returning, EK204 leaves New York at 11:20, arriving back in Dubai at 07:50 the following day.
This addition will complement the existing A380 service from Dubai to JFK, EK201. This route is an early morning Dubai departure operating daily, which has seen the A380 back in action since early June.
Clearly, the Emirates service to JFK has been popular, despite the ongoing challenges of traveling internationally. The majority of the services on EK201 are showing as ‘business class only’ on the Emirates booking engine. Simple Flying has reached out to Emirates regarding the demand for these flights and will update this article accordingly.
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The growth of A380 operations
Emirates has been slowly bringing the A380 back into service following the COVID crisis. With the largest fleet in the world, the airline has been unable to follow in the footsteps of its Middle East rivals, both of whom have removed the type from service long term.
As such, the giant aircraft has been slowly making its way back into the schedule for the summer. By early July, three more North American destinations aside from JFK were seeing A380 service: Los Angeles, Toronto and Washington.
August has seen something of a slowdown in terms of destinations that the A380 will visit. Just one new destination was added - Mauritius, which would see two rotations a week to the island paradise, catering to leisure travelers connecting through the Dubai hub.
Although new destinations were scarce in august, the airline was busy ramping up frequencies at its most important airports. Munich saw three flights added for the month, while Guangzhou saw two. Amman had four additional flights scheduled for the month, while the always interesting short hop to Jeddah has 13 more flights added in August.
As well as scheduled flights, Emirates has been operating some one-off services, including one to bring back athletes from the Tokyo Olympics. Sadly, its Stansted to Orlando special flight for the Arsenal football team ended up being canceled after members of the team tested positive for COVID.
Have you seen an Emirates A380 this year yet?