Philippines national carrier Philippines Airlines hope to have sanctions lifted by US Civil Aviation and European Aviation Authorities to add flights to the USA and come back to Europe.
REPORT – PATA Travel Mart – MANILA – On the video, a smiling pretty Filipino girl praises the latest aircraft arrival into Philippine Airlines fleet, the Boeing 777-300 ER, the new pride of Philippines national carrier. She indicates that with the brand new aircraft offering superior confort, PAL will be able to launchnon-stop services to North American cities such as Toronto or New York and fly to its favourite European city London but also to Frankfurt, Paris and Rome… Is it a subliminal message about an imminent return of Philippines Airlines to Europe after more than a decade of absence?
At a press conference hosted during the PATA Travel Mart, Felix Cruz, PAL Vice President Marketing Support, confirmed that the Filipino carrier is indeed ready to expand overseas. But it will all depend of civil aviation authorities in the United States and in Europe. The brand new aircraft, which will be able to fly 14,000 km non-stop, is the new pride of PAL.
“We want to fly to New York, add extra flights to our current network in the USA but we wait for the US CAA to upgrade again Philippines civil aviation to category 1 from category 2. I know that the government works hard to convince US authorities that safety in our countries reaches the best standards but there is little we can do. In Europe, Filipino carriers are all on the EU blacklist. We do our maintenance with Lufthansa and pass successfully IATA safety audit IOSA. There is little we can do ourselves and we now hope for a partial lifting of the EU ban, at least for us”, said Felix Cruz. The airline is likely to start flying first to Frankfurt which used to be its largest European operation and then fly to London and Paris.
The VP Marketing Support however announced that PAL will start flying to Toronto with the new Boeing 777-300 ER. Two aircraft will be delivered this year with two other by next year. Among other new routes is a flight to Darwin which could start by early next year.
Within the ASEAN, PAL sees the most opportunities to Indonesia. “This is a huge market with very strong potential. We already boosted the total number of flights to Jakarta and opened earlier this year flights to Bali”, added Cruz. PAL VP told also that the airline is paying a close look to the development of emerging ASEAN destinations such as Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar.
Regarding alliances, PAL is currently upgrading its IT with Sabre, which could pave the way to a future membership with Oneworld. PAL works already in close cooperation with Cathay Pacific and would feet at best into the Oneworld network. But it might take another year or two before a concrete announcement.
They are also plans by PAL shareholder San Miguel to build a greenfield airport in Manila for 40 million passengers. However Felix Cruz did not provide further details, even not on the possible location of the future air facility…
Luc Citrinot a French national is a freelance journalist and consultant in tourism and air transport with over 20 years experience. Based in Paris and Bangkok, he works for various travel and air transport trade publications in Europe and Asia.
