PIA to partially resume flights to UK from 14th

Published August 6, 2020
Passengers will be able to travel to London, Manchester and Birmingham from Pakistan to PIA under the new arrangement. — APP/File
Passengers will be able to travel to London, Manchester and Birmingham from Pakistan to PIA under the new arrangement. — APP/File

RAWALPINDI: The Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) will partially resume its flights to the United Kingdom from Aug 14 with a hired plane.

PIA spokesman Abdullah Hafeez said on Wednesday that an agreement had been signed between Portugal’s airline and the national carrier.

He said the PIA would operate flights with an Airbus A330, having a seating capacity of more than 300 passengers.

“The PIA has hired a plane and crew from a European company to operate flights using PIA call sign and slots,” he said, adding: “Due to public demand, the national flag carrier is resuming its flights.”

The plane would have economy and business classes with comfortable seating capacity, he said.

Aircraft hired from European company

Mr Hafeez said that passengers would be able to travel to London, Manchester and Birmingham from Pakistan under the new arrangement.

He said that social distancing would be strictly observed in all the flights.

The spokesman said a PIA flight, PK-9702, would depart for Islamabad from Manchester with 250 passengers on Aug 14.

On August 15, PIA flight PK-9785 will depart from Islamabad for London.

He said that booking of seats had been started and all seats had been booked for the first flight.

The spokesman said that the airline would facilitate passengers with 45kg of baggage per passenger on the flights.

He said that after the suspension of PIA flights to the UK, other airlines had increased fares and it was expected that after the resumption of PIA flights, fares of other airlines would also come down.

Published in Dawn, August 6th, 2020

Opinion

Editorial

Defining extremism
Updated 18 Mar, 2024

Defining extremism

Redefining extremism may well be the first step to clamping down on advocacy for Palestine.
Climate in focus
18 Mar, 2024

Climate in focus

IN a welcome order by the Supreme Court, the new government has been tasked with providing a report on actions taken...
Growing rabies concern
18 Mar, 2024

Growing rabies concern

DOG-BITE is an old problem in Pakistan. Amid a surfeit of public health challenges, rabies now seems poised to ...
Provincial share
Updated 17 Mar, 2024

Provincial share

PPP has aptly advised Centre to worry about improving its tax collection rather than eying provinces’ share of tax revenues.
X-communication
17 Mar, 2024

X-communication

IT has now been a month since Pakistani authorities decided that the country must be cut off from one of the...
Stateless humanity
17 Mar, 2024

Stateless humanity

THE endless hostility between India and Pakistan has reduced prisoners to mere statistics. Although the two ...