In his annual ‘state of the airline’ informative briefing, Enda Corneille, Emirates’ Manager for Ireland, said that the airline would consider a third daily flight from Dublin to Dubai. This would increase the transfer options to the 158 onwards destinations from Dubai.
However a third flight could only happen when the proposed development plan for Dublin Airport is completed.
Emirates celebrated its two millionth passenger on the route in December 2017 and is set to hit 2.5 million passengers by December of this year. The average load factor for the route is 85%.
On average, Emirates carries 22,000 customers each month from Dublin to Dubai and onwards to 158 destinations. The most popular destinations include Sydney, Perth, Melbourne, Singapore, Hong Kong and Cape Town, with increased demand recently for Vietnam and the Philippines.
There are 10,000 Irish expats who live in the United Arab Emirates and 555 of these are employed by Emirates, with more than 30 employed in Ireland.
Enda Corneille spoke of the importance of the travel trade to Emirates and said: “We enjoy the support of travel agents throughout the island of Ireland and it would make no sense to undermine this support.”
For the period from April 2018-March 2019, Emirates SkyCargo, the freight division of Emirates, carried export cargo of 8,000 tonnes and imports of 6,400 tonnes. Products carried included Irish seafood, cheese, chocolate, beef, pharmaceuticals and electronics, with Shanghai being the top destination.
New routes from Dubai recently announced are Oporto in Portugal and Mexico City via Barcelona.
