Qatar Airways Increases Thailand Services

[HD video below] Qatar Airways is celebrating its 10th anniversary of flights to Thailand with expanded operations to help strengthen commercial and economic ties between the two countries.

The recent launch of flights to the holiday island of Phuket and increased frequency on the Bangkok route has doubled the number of flights from 14 to 28 a week between the airline’s Doha hub and Thailand.

“Our two countries share a long-standing friendship which has grown from strength to strength,” said Qatar Airways Chief Executive Officer, Akbar Al Baker. “Our new Phuket flights will help boost the tourism economy year round on this beautiful island. With strong response to our Phuket services, particularly from across our key European feeder markets, I am delighted to say that we have now upgraded the flights to a daily operation ... When we announced Phuket as a new destination in June, we saw a huge surge in bookings for the peak winter period. It was a timely launch ahead of the busy holiday season so demand has prompted us to increase capacity. We are the only Middle East carrier flying to Phuket and this new service will help create new jobs and support the local economy beyond the regular seasonal traffic.”

The Phuket route began with six-flights-a-week on 12 October 2010, but was stepped up to daily services from 1 November 2010. All the flights are routed via the Malaysian capital, Kuala Lumpur.

The airline is celebrating 10 years of flying to Thailand’s capital city of Bangkok this year with the introduction of a new daily flight from 1 November 2010, taking capacity up from double to thrice-daily services. The total number of flights between Qatar and Thailand now stands at 28 a week.

Four of the new Bangkok flights continue onto Hanoi and three onto Ho Chi Minh City. Passengers originating in Thailand or Vietnam can also purchase tickets to fly between Bangkok and both Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City on Qatar Airways.

The travel market in Asia is experiencing significant growth and one which Al Baker stressed Qatar Airways was well placed to take advantage of.

“IATA statistics have passenger demand in the Asia Pacific region up over 10% on the previous year. The timing of Qatar Airways’ expansion drive in Asia couldn’t be better to take advantage of this increase in traffic,” he said.

The launch of flights to Phuket and Hanoi increases Qatar Airways’ Asia Pacific route network to 18 destinations.

Qatar Airways CEO Interview in November 2010

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