HCMC – Local carrier Bamboo Airways last weekend operated its first direct flights linking HCMC with Australia’s Melbourne, marking the next milestone in the carrier’s roadmap to exploit the Vietnam-Australia direct air route, said Truong Phuong Thanh, vice general director of the carrier.
Aside from the HCMC-Melbourne direct route, the carrier planned to open more routes linking the major cities of Vietnam and Australia.
Flights on the HCMC-Melbourne route will help shorten the travel time between the two cities to around eight hours, saving eight hours compared to transit flights.
The carrier uses 787-9 Dreamliner aircraft, which are fuel-efficient and offer a wide range of services, to operate flights on this route.
Earlier in December last year, the carrier announced the launch of the Vietnam-Australia direct air route and signed deals with the Melbourne airport and Victoria State to operate the route.
Australia is among the countries with the largest Vietnamese communities, with over 300,000 people. Most of them are in Sydney and Melbourne.
Meanwhile, according to data released by the Vietnam National Administration of Tourism, more than 383,000 tourists from Australia visited Vietnam in 2019.
Anticipating that the aviation industry could bounce back strongly this year, Bamboo Airways has planned to expand its international network to nearly 40 routes.
The carrier will operate flights linking Hanoi with Frankfurt this month and London next month. It will also speed up efforts to offer services on the HCMC-Frankfurt and the Hanoi/HCMC-Munich routes in the upcoming time.
In Southeast Asia, it will operate flights on the HCMC-Singapore route in March and to many other destinations in the region this summer.
