British Airways is bringing back its A380 aircraft earlier than expected and is ramping up transatlantic schedules as US borders reopen next month.
The Airbus aircraft will initially fly in November to a number of short-haul destinations to allow for crew service familiarisation, shortly followed by Miami and Los Angeles then to Dubai in December.
BA also announced today that it will be adding more services to key US cities, including New York, which will initially be increasing to five a day followed by eight in December.
The airline will also be operating double-daily services to Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Washington, Dallas, Miami and Toronto, as well as daily services to Philadelphia, Phoenix, Seattle, Atlanta, Denver, Houston and Vancouver
Alongside frequency increases, in October and November BA will restart services to Austin, Orlando, Tampa, San Diego, Las Vegas and Baltimore.
In December the airline will also restart flying to Nashville and New Orleans.
BA’s airport lounges in Chicago, Washington, San Francisco and Houston are expected to open this week.
Neil Chernoff, British Airways’ Director of Network and Alliances, said: “This is an exciting time for British Airways and our customers as we see borders re-opening. With welcome news from the US, we are dramatically increasing flights and bringing home some of our A380s to give our customers as many options as possible.”
Short-haul, BA will be increasing flights year-round to key European cities with 48 weekly services to Amsterdam, 33 to Geneva, 35 to Dublin, 28 to Milan and 21 to Berlin, Paris and Rome.
Its subsidiary BA City Flyer is expected to operate a schedule of 43 flights a week to Edinburgh, 33 to Dublin, 25 to Glasgow, 18 to Belfast, 16 to Amsterdam, 15 to Rotterdam, 15 to Berlin, 12 to Frankfurt, 12 to Dusseldorf and 11 to Zurich.
The airline is also set to launch a new route from Belfast to Birmingham, as well as new ski destination, Salzburg, from London City and Southampton.