Japan Airlines is gearing up for a busy winter due to a favorable market recovery, resulting in a steady increase in travel demand for both business and tourism customers. The carrier is increasing its flight frequencies to popular US and Asia routes and preparing for its New York flight later this year with its new flagship A350-1000 aircraft.

International services to increase

Japan Airlines (JAL) has announced that it will increase frequencies on some international routes this winter as passenger demand has increased in post-COVID travel recovery. The airline says that it will offer convenient services to passengers by upping the flights on the following routes:

• Increase of the Narita - Hong Kong service from 3 to 5 flights per week.
• Increase of the Kansai - Los Angeles service from 4 to 5 flights per week.
• Increase of the Kansai - Honolulu service in November from 4 to 5 flights per week, and increase of the Nagoya (Chubu) -Honolulu service from 3 to 4 flights per week.

Photo: Abdul N Quraishi - Abs | Shutterstock

Travel boom

JAL is still adjusting the plans for certain routes and schedules and will give a detailed update once they are finalized. A surge in travel demand has led the airline to up the frequencies of international flights, as there has been a steady increase in demand for both business and tourism customers arriving in and departing from Japan.

The airline is also preparing for the new flagship Airbus A350-1000 aircraft, scheduled to start operating on the Haneda - New York route in late November. JAL has also said that a new business class product is coming for the new Airbus widebodies, which will be unveiled on October 2nd.

Domestic frequencies to increase, too

Japan also has a robust domestic market that is responding to the recovering demand and market conditions. JAL is making adjustments to several domestic flights, taking into account the trends in customer demand.

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It is increasing the Osaka (Itami) – Izumo service from 4 round trips to 5 round trips per day from October 29th, and Osaka (Itami) – Kagoshima service from 7 round trips to 8 round trips per day from December 1st.

Furthermore, it is launching new routes from Sapporo (Okadama) utilizing the newly introduced aircraft from Hokkaido Air System (HAC), starting October 25th. The airline is finalizing the inaugural flight date, flight frequency, and schedule for the Sapporo (Okadama) – Nemuro Nakashibetsu.

Japan’s domestic traffic has already returned to 100% of pre-pandemic levels as the economy bounced back and the absence of internal travel restrictions. Domestic passenger numbers and revenue grew 1.4 times compared to the first quarter of FY22.

First net profit after four years

These route announcements come close on the heels of the JAL Group announcing its consolidated financial results for the first quarter of its 2023 fiscal year (FY23Q1), covering the period from April 1st to June 30th, 2023.

Photo: KITTIKUN YOKSAP | Shutterstock

The Group, which includes Japan Airlines, ZIPAIR, SPRING JAPAN, and Jetstar Japan, reported a Q1 operating profit of 31.3 billion yen ($219 million) and a net profit attributable to owners of 23 billion yen ($161m).

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