LONDON – Virgin Atlantic has announced that it will now be restarting services to Seattle and Washington DC which means that the carrier has now completed its full roster of U.S based destinations, this is the first time it has operated all of these services since the start of the pandemic. The airline also confirmed that it would begin to offer more flights to Los Angeles and Orlando, saying it will offer more flights to the destinations than any other carrier.
In addition to the increase of flights to Los Angeles and Orlando, Virgin Atlantic said it would increase the capacity of flights to New York, San Francisco, and Atlanta, which alongside the airlines partner Delta Air Lines, will see it offer more daily services to these U.S destinations from the UK than most other airlines.
Juha Jarvinen, Chief Commercial Officer at Virgin Atlantic said: “Following the relaxation of travel restrictions, we’ve seen demand increase to many of our global destinations, but particularly to our heartland in the USA. Our customers can’t wait to return.”
“The restart of our Seattle and Washington DC services marks an important milestone, as we move into recovery and welcome our customers back on board to all the destinations they’ve missed. We’re simply not Virgin without the Atlantic and our growing transatlantic portfolio demonstrates why we’re the airline of choice to the USA.”
Flights to Seattle and Washington DC are due to start next week. In April the airline is then expected to launch its third daily service to Los Angles, which means it will operate more daily services from the UK to the Californian destination than any other airline. Virgin Atlantic then confirmed it would begin to operate flights to Orlando from its four UK gateways ok Heathrow, Manchester, Edinburgh, and Belfast, something which the carrier has been well known for in the pre-covid years where it would dedicate most of its 747s to operate this services over the summer schedule period.
Beginning on March 2, the airline will fly to Seattle on a five times weekly service, using its Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner on the route, which has the airline’s famous onboard bar and top of the range in-flight entertainment systems onboard, Seattle is also the home of Boeing and so this is the perfect tribute to the U.S destination.
Finally then on March 5, the Heathrow to Washinton DC services will begin to operate on a five times weekly service, with the carrier using one of its Airbus A330 aircraft, it is an important route and service with a large demand for business and leisure travel from the U.S destination. Last month Virgin Atlantic announced its first new U.S destination since 2015, confirmed it would begin service to Austin, Texas, which are due to start from May 25 and will operate on a four times weekly service, the airline did not confirm however which aircraft would service the route.
