Qantas launches three new weekly Perth - Hong Kong flights

The first of three new weekly non-stop Qantas services from Perth to Hong Kong took off Monday, marking the 55th anniversary of Qantas flights between Australia and Hong Kong. 

Regional General Manager Australia Sales Peter Collins said the addition of these services meant that Qantas was now flying non-stop more frequently from Australia to Hong Kong than it did before the outbreak of SARS a year ago.

"These new flights bring to 24 the number of weekly international services from Perth and will provide a significant boost to West Australian tourism," Mr Collins said.

"Qantas now operates direct services from Perth to five Asian destinations - Hong Kong, Bali, Jakarta, Tokyo and Singapore - with connections to London, Paris and Frankfurt."

Mr Collins said the Perth-Hong Kong services would initially be operated by two-class Boeing 767-300s, with Airbus A330-300s commencing on the route later this year.

"The A330-300 services will provide an additional 204 seats into Perth each week including the state-of-the-art, award-winning Skybed in Business Class.

"Qantas is also expanding direct domestic flights to and from Western Australia with the recent addition of daily Canberra-Perth services and new Cairns-Perth and Sydney-Broome services commencing this week.

"We opened a flight attendants' base in Perth in January 2001 and the number of crew at the base has now grown to 270."

The new flights to Hong Kong will depart from Perth on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays at 9.15am arriving in Hong Kong at 5.15pm local time.