Second Emirates superjumbo to fly from Birmingham
Airline Emirates is to introduce a second double-decker Airbus A380 at Birmingham Airport in the wake of the huge popularity of the superjumbo flights to Dubai.
Emirates started flying one of the giant passenger planes from Birmingham in March last year and more than 300,000 people have travelled on it so far.
The new A380 will join Emirates Birmingham operation in October, taking over on a service currently handled by a Boeing 777. Instead of three flights a day there will be two, both using the world's largest passenger aircraft, which can carry up to 615 passengers apiece.
Emirates said it had decided to introduce the second super-jumbo "due to the immense popularity of the iconic aircraft". It also fits with connecting services with other A380 flights from the airline's hub in Dubai on to other destinations around the world, such as Auckland, Bangkok, Beijing, Perth, Singapore and Sydney.
The new aircraft will take over the service, with the flight number EK39/40, from October 29.
An airline spokesman said: "Emirates’ decision to use a double-daily A380 service was in part driven by huge demand from passengers to travel on the iconic aircraft. Since the first A380 service from Dubai to Birmingham launched on March 27, 2016, over 300,000 passengers have already flown on the aircraft between the two cities."
As with the current A380 used on the route, the aircraft will operate in a two class configuration, featuring 58 flat-bed seats in Business Class and 557 seats in Economy Class.
The expansion comes after Emirates launched new services last year to places including Cebu and Clark in the Philippines, Yinchuan and Zhengzhou in mainland China, Yangon in Myanmar and Hanoi in Vietnam. On July 1 Emirates will also start flying daily to Phnom Penh, Cambodia.
Emirates started flying to Birmingham in December 2000 as a daily service from Dubai, operated by a 278-seat Airbus A330. Since then it has carried over 5.2 million passengers between Dubai and Birmingham.
As well as tourists and business travellers, a large proportion of those travelling on the route are the international students who fly to Birmingham every year to attend the prestigious schools and universities in the region.
