In a recent development, as the UK government has once again binned its red-list, the national flag bearing airline British Airways has decided to restore its flights to Johannesburg this coming January. The reinstated flights from British Airways include Airbus A380 carriers. Earlier in December, as new travel restrictions were imposed due to a surge in the number of cases of Omicron variant, the airline had pushed back the commencement dates of flights to February of 2022.
Why Johannesburg and the New Flight Schedule
For those unaware, British Airways has been on a move to restore all of the A380s in its fleet and has already relaunched long-haul double-decker flights in the first half of December. South Africa has been on the red list countries for the UK for the majority of this year. This has resulted in South Africa being in huge demand in the list of destinations and it must have been a rather easier decision for the world’s largest passenger aircraft to make to launch flights to Johannesburg.
Back in November, it was reported that British Airways is looking to restore its Airbus A380s for Johannesburg from January 10, 2022, which would offer a daily service alongside a Boeing 777. However, the plans had to be scrapped in the wake of the widespread Omicron variant of Covid-19. Which resulted in South Africa being back on the red-listed countries along with a few other neighbouring countries of the UK.
The recent reports have suggested the new schedule data for British Airways suggesting that Airbus A380s will commence operations from January 17, 2022. However, instead of running in conjunction with Boeing carriers as BA55 and BA56, the new schedule will reinstate A380s in place of Boeing carriers as BA57 and BA58. The report informs that from January 17, 2022, Flight BA 57 will take off from London Heathrow at 21:10 and will arrive at Johannesburg at 11h 05m while the returning flight will take off from Johannesburg at 22:15 and arrive at London Heathrow at 11h 20m.
