Eastern Australia Airlines (EAQ, Tamworth) will operate a fleet of five DHC-8-300s on behalf of Jetstar Airways (JQ, Melbourne Airport) as the latter moves to enter the domestic New Zealand market in December this year.
In a statement, Jetstar said subject to regulatory approval, it would connect one or more of its current domestic destinations - Christchurch, Gold Coast Coolangatta, Dunedin, Melbourne Airport, Queenstown International, Sydney Kingsford Smith, and Wellington - with four destinations initially.
Among the towns under consideration are Hamilton, NZ, Rotorua, New Plymouth, Napier/Hastings, and Palmerston North on the North Island and Nelson, NZ and Invercargill on the South Island, it said.
“We’re answering that call by launching Jetstar flights to regional New Zealand, making air travel more affordable for people who live outside the main centres and boosting tourism and the economies of these areas," Qantas Group CEO Alan Joyce, said. “These new regional destinations will connect with the broader Qantas Group network, including both Qantas and Jetstar flying across the Tasman, to make these parts of New Zealand more accessible to international travellers."
The Jetstar-branded services, which will be marketed and managed by Jetstar, will be operated by QantasLink. Under this arrangement, Qantas-owned Eastern Australia Airlines, which has operated Q300 aircraft in Australia for QantasLink for over 15 years, will manage the aircraft operations.
Later this year, New Zealand's Kiwi Regional Airlines (Hamilton, NZ) is hoping to commence scheduled domestic operations in a bid to fill the gap left by Air New Zealand (NZ, Auckland International) which terminated a number of Beech 1900D operated domestic flights in April citing low viability.
