The first Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) direct flight to London in six years took to the skies on Sunday afternoon after a special inauguration ceremony at Islamabad International Airport and landed at Heathrow airport hours later.

The national flag carrier is expected to operate four weekly flights from Islamabad to London. These will be operated from Heathrow Airport’s Terminal 4, according to an earlier statement issued by the PIA spokesperson.

PK-785’s voyage was inaugurated by Defence Secretary Lt Gen (r) Muhammad Ali, British High Commissioner Jane Mariott, and Chairman PIA Consortium Arif Habib, who jointly cut the ribbon, state-run Pakistan TV reported.

The flight was scheduled to take off at 12:50pm, but faced a slight delay, eventually departing at 1:19pm.

On March 26, Defence Minister Khawaja Asif had said that the PIA would commence its first direct flights from Islamabad and Lahore to London’s Heathrow Airport on March 29 and 30, respectively.

Last September, PIA had received the go-ahead to resume direct flights to the UK after a gap of nearly five years. Subsequently, the airline resumed flights to the UK, with flight operations to Manchester resuming in the first phase.

At the time, the airline had said it planned to extend operations to Birmingham and London as well.