In more great news for Aussie travelers Virgin Australia is reportedly gearing up to begin a new daily service between Cairns and Tokyo’s Haneda Airport. According to the Aeroroutes website which is known for following closely airline schedules and development Virgin are set to deploy its Boeing 737 Max on the 7.5 hours route from 23rd June 2023.
The proposed flights subject to Government approval will see VA 77 depart Cairns at 1.15pm before arriving into Tokyo at 8pm the same day whilst the inbound flight will be wheels up out of Tokyo Haneda at 9.45pm before reaching Cairns at 6.15am the following morning.
Whilst Virgin Australia are yet to officially comment or confirm the reports it is important to remember that the airline has previously planned to launched Brisbane to Tokyo flights in early 2020 before Pandemic skuttled those plans. Virgin then went into administration at the early onset on Covid and its new owners Bein Capital disposing of its widebody Airbus A330 and Boeing 777 fleets further putting the resumption of the planned route further out of reach.
Due to the prior plans being scrapped on the Brisbane to Tokyo route the airline despite having managed to to secure a landing slot into Tokyo Haneda the airline now faces a precarious ‘use it or loose it’ situation where The International Air Services Commission (IASC) has given the airline a deadline of 26th March 2023 to confirm any plans to use the slot. This is despite the airline no longer having the widebodies necessary to operate the route from Australia’s major capital cities. With the Boeing 737 Max having a theoretical range of just over 4000 miles or a flight time of just over 8 hours Darwin or Cairns are the only real possible options for the airline to operate flights to Japan without resorting to leasing aircraft. Due to Cairns strong popularity with the Japanese tourist market it is therefore not hard to see why the airline could be inclined to enter the route which is already serviced by Jetstar.
AussieJetSetter will be sure to report on any further developments on the proposed route once any further information comes to light,
