Alaska’s elites will get access to Emirates’ business class lounge at Dubai. (Photo: Chris McGinnis)
In international route news, Alaska Air takes on a new code-sharing partner; United will drop flights to Kuwait and Bahrain; Lufthansa adds a Denver route; British Airways will revive service to Gatwick and changes planes to Miami; and Austrian Airlines adds a U.S. route.
- Alaska Airlines and Emirates have had a frequent flyer program partnership since 2012, with reciprocal mileage-earning and spending, but now they’re getting even closer. Subject to government approval, they plan to begin code-sharing that will enable travelers from 49 Alaska cities to connect seamlessly to Emirates’ twice-daily flights from Seattle to Dubai. The deal will put Emirates’ code onto as many as 300 Alaska flights a day (although the announcement says nothing about Alaska’s code going onto the Emirates flights). In addition, Alaska’s MVP Gold and MVP Gold 75 elites will be able to use Emirates business class lounges at Dubai, and will get priority boarding and check-in at Seattle, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Dubai; and Emirates elites will be able to use Alaska’s Board Room lounges at four airports.
- United Airlines is no longer taking reservations for travel on its very-long-haul flight from Washington Dulles to Kuwait and Bahrain after January 13, according to airlineroute.net. And it may not be a matter of insufficient traffic on the route. According to one popular blogger, United’s route termination may have been ordered by the Kuwaitis due to anger over U.S. anti-discrimination laws that will not allow airlines serving the U.S. to deny boarding to Israeli passport holders — something Kuwait Airlines reportedly did on a London-New York flight.
- In addition to its existing daily service from Denver to Frankfurt, Lufthansa says it will begin flying from Denver to Munich five times a week effective May 11, 2016. The German carrier will use an A330-300 with first class, business class, premium economy and economy seating.
Gatwick Airport is about 30 mins south of Victoria Station (Image: Visit London)
- British Airways and joint venture partner American have plenty of flights in the New York-London Heathrow market, but next spring BA plans to add a flight from New York JFK to London Gatwick as well, according to airlinerotue.net. Effective May 16, British Airways will use a 777-200ER to operate daily service on the JFK-LGW route, which it last served in 2009. In other news, British Airways has just started flying a big Airbus A380 super-jumbo on its London Heathrow-Miami route. The 469-passenger A380, with four classes of seating, will initially operate one of BA’s two daily Miami flights; the other will still use a 747.
- Speaking of Miami, Austrian Airlines — a member of the Lufthansa Group — has added the Florida city as its newest U.S. gateway. The new Miami-Vienna flights, using a two-class 777, operate five days a week (Monday, Wednesday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday).
NOTE: Be sure to click here to see all recent TravelSkills posts about: Global Entry gets more global + New York’s lowest ranked hotels +Best/worst hotel programs for awards + More flat seats
Do you follow us on Twitter? It’s a great way to keep up with the latest news!
Please join the 100,000+ people who read TravelSkills every month! Sign up here for one email-per-day updates!
So we get access to the Emirates lounges and they get the Boardroom’s ? Boy did they get the wrong end of that stick! Don’t get me wrong I enjoy and use the relationship but really AS is competing with the big boys with substandard lounges, can’t wait to hear the complaints from EK flyers
It also means that their miles are worthless. Often if say 20 seats are available, they will only set aside a few, or none, for miles.
Basically, what is the point of “earning” miles when you can no longer use them. Eventually the customers will learn.
If there is no award availability, that usually means that they have been successful at selling those premium cabin seats. In that case, sounds like they actually do have their “act together”.
thanks! We’ll update title
“United Drops Mid-East”? As far as I know, TLV (Which UA is about to add SFO service to) and DXB are still in the Middle East.
Interesting about Lufthansa and Denver, but I have pretty much given up on Lufthansa, even though I have several hundred thousand Miles & More miles. Award availability in business or first class from the West Coast to Europe is totally nonexistent these days. I mean totally. I have been checking off and on for two months now, and I cannot find a single flight from SFO to any city in Europe (even to FRA or MUC) between now and spring 2016 in business or first using my miles. And then they kill you with fees when you redeem the miles. And then on top of that, the Vereinigung Cockpit pilot strikes make Lufthansa travel unreliable sometimes, with tens of thousands of travelers stranded for a day or two and dream vacations utterly ruined. It’s very sad, because I used to love flying Lufthansa. I hope they get their act together soon.
UA’s flight to Kuwait is not a very long haul flight. it’s only approximately 5713nm (6575sm) far shorter than any UA non-stop to HKG, CTU, IAD-NRT and the flights from California to SYD and I almost forgot EWR-DEL.