Dubai: Emirates President Tim Clark said he hoped the Dubai-based carrier will restore capacity to the United States in early to mid-2018 after Emirates cut down on flights in May this year.
Speaking at an aviation conference in London on Thursday, Clark said he hoped capacity to the US will be restored in six to nine months, Reuters reported.
“Demand for travel is still fairly strong, and I’m hoping that in the next six to nine months that we will restore our capacity to what it was,” Clark said, as per Reuters reports.
His comments come just a few months after Emirates airline announced it will reduce flights to five of the 12 US cities it serves including Los Angeles, Boston, Seattle, Orlando and Fort Lauderdale. The carrier said at the time that the move was “a commercial decision in response to weakened travel demand to the US.”
A spokesperson said at that time that Emirates will monitor the situation with the view of adding back US flights “as soon as viable.”
Emirates said the decline in demand was in response to actions taken by the US government relating to issuing entry visas to citizens of certain countries, heightened security vetting and restrictions on electronic devices in aircraft cabins.
Clark in June then said that demand to cities where Emirates had cut capacity had started to improve.
The electronics ban, which was implemented in March 2017 on flights to the US from 10 Middle Eastern airports, was lifted in early July off UAE-based flights.
— With additional inputs from Reuters
