Royal Brunei Airlines (BI, Bandar Seri Begawan) has announced it will start non-stop flights to Europe later this winter season. At present, the Southeast Asian carrier serves London Heathrow with a 6x weekly return service which operates via Dubai International.
However, effective October 28, the flights will omit the Middle Eastern stop in favour of a daily direct service. With the introduction of the daily non-stop flights to London, Royal Brunei said it will cease its 5th Freedom Dubai-London-Dubai route. However, it will continue to serve Dubai via a 4x weekly service effective October 29.
“The introduction of RB’s non-stop flight to London Heathrow will be a significant milestone as for the first time Brunei and England will be seamlessly connected by a direct air link. With the strong cultural, economic and political ties between the two countries, it is only natural to provide the seamless non-stop connection. The through flight via Dubai has served us well however with the demand for more direct routing from our guests, it becomes an important commercial imperative to provide that," Karam Chand, RB Chief Executive Officer, said in a statement.
"The non-stop flights will also be an enabler for increasing tourism from UK and Europe. We have had a record 2017 for visitor arrivals and the initiatives such as the London direct, additional Seoul flights, China charter flights and to be announced new markets will play a pivotal role in getting half a million visitors to our shores by 2021."
Royal Brunei currently operates four B787-8s deploying them on flights to Hong Kong International, Jeddah International, Kuala Lumpur International, Melbourne Tullamarine, Shanghai Pudong, Singapore Changi, and Surabaya.
