British Airways to resume flights to Cape Town, ramp up service by December

Airline plans double daily flights to Cape Town and daily flights to Joburg

Aron Hyman Reporter
British Airways is set to ramp up services to SA, with daily services to Johannesburg expected by mid-December.
British Airways is set to ramp up services to SA, with daily services to Johannesburg expected by mid-December.
Image: Peter Nicholls/Reuters

British Airways expects to ramp up its services to SA to include double daily flights between the UK and Cape Town by mid-December following SA’s removal from the UK’s much criticised Covid-19 “red list”.

On Friday the airline said it was expecting to offer daily services to Johannesburg, also by mid-December.

“Following the welcome news that a significant number of countries have been removed from the UK government’s red list, British Airways is resuming services and increasing frequencies to a number of destinations.

“British Airways is set to ramp up services to popular winter sun destination SA, with daily services to Johannesburg expected by mid-December. The airline will also restart services to Cape Town, offering three flights a week in November before moving to a double daily service in December,” it read.

As part of the relaunch of its Cape Town service, British Airways Holidays is offering promotions, including special hotel packages in November.

After the announcement of SA’s removal from the red list on Thursday evening, Western Cape MEC for finance and economic opportunities David Maynier said the UK is one of the province’s most important tourist countries.

He said in 2019 about 194,900 UK tourists visited the Western Cape, spending on average R24,200 per tourist.

British Airways chairperson and CEO Sean Doyle said the next step was for testing to be eradicated for fully vaccinated travellers.

“It finally feels like we are seeing light at the end of a very long tunnel. Britain will benefit from this significant reduction in red-list countries, and it’s time to turn our attention to eradicating testing for fully vaccinated travellers to ensure we don’t lose our place on the global stage,” said Doyle.

TimesLIVE


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