Virgin Atlantic to take off 90 cargo-only flights a week from May; 3 services for Joburg

April 28, 2020: Starting May, Virgin Atlantic Cargo will operate over 90 cargo-only flights per week as it helps customers reopen vital trade lanes connecting the UK with prime freight markets in the US, Hong Kong and China, India, Israel and South Africa.

The airline will also operate cargo-only flights through Dublin for the first time, enabling Ireland's medical technology, electronics and other industries to achieve same day connections to New York JFK, Los Angeles, Hong Kong, Tel Aviv, and Johannesburg. Services will be operated using the airline's B787-9 aircraft, which can carry up to 55 tonnes of cargo.

Recently, the carrier has announced the relaunch of scheduled cargo-only flights from London to Tel Aviv from May 6.

The May flying programme includes:

%u2022 Three services a week to/from Johannesburg

%u2022 17 flights a week to/from JFK

%u2022 9 flights a week to/from Los Angeles

%u2022 Twice-weekly services from JFK and Los Angeles to Dublin

%u2022 Twice-weekly departures from Dublin to London

%u2022 Daily flights to/from Shanghai

%u2022 4x weekly services to/from Hong Kong

%u2022 Twice-weekly flights to/from Tel Aviv

%u2022 Resumption of two weekly flights to/from Mumbai

With 14 aircraft at its disposal for cargo-only operations, including four A350s capable of carrying up to 49 tonnes of goods, Virgin Atlantic will also increase its ability to offer exclusive cargo charters, which currently average 13 flights per week.

Dominic Kennedy, MD of Virgin Atlantic Cargo said, "I am amazingly proud of our cargo team and our colleagues across the airline who have enabled us to completely re-engineer our cargo business into a successful freight-only operation. This means we've been able to help our customers re-establish trade routes to and from many of their major international markets. I also want to thank dnata, our handling partner in London, for the great work its team is doing to help us accelerate the volume of cargo we are carrying and to expedite connections over our London hub. In the current operating environment, we have the ability to increase our cargo-only services quickly and to flex up our schedules in line with demand."

Virgin Atlantic Cargo and Delta Cargo have moved handling operations at London Heathrow to the new purpose-built dnata City East last year. The move to the new facility expects to double the size of Virgin and Delta's cargo operation at Heathrow to 335,000 square feet.