Oneworld alliance member and Qantas partner Cathay Pacific will boost its flights between Adelaide and Hong Kong with the addition of a fifth weekly non-stop service.
From December 2 2015, CX174 from Adelaide will run on Thursdays in addition to the previous Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Sunday departures, leaving the South Australian capital at 7:45am to reach Hong Kong at 2pm.
On the return, CX173 gains a Wednesday flight to join frequencies on Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday and Sunday, with a tweaked departure time of 7:05pm ahead of an arrival into Adelaide of 6:20am the following morning.
Cathay Pacific previously trimmed its Adelaide route from daily to four-times-weekly, but in doing so made every remaining flight a non-stop service to ditch the previous Melbourne detour.
“Since we introduced our new schedule in early April last year which provides better connections, particularly to the UK and Chinese destinations, we have seen demand surge,” said Nelson Chin, Cathay Pacific’s General Manager Southwest Pacific.
“Our flights have been very popular and we have seen increased numbers of tourists into Adelaide from mainland China, as well as South Australians taking advantage of the fast connections to China, Asia, London and North America via Hong Kong,” he added.
Cathay Pacific also features a number of South Australian products on board including a Jurlique skincare range in the business class amenity kits, Maggie Beer ice cream and both Dandelion Vineyards and D’Arenburg wines.
Qantas Frequent Flyer members can earn and redeem points when travelling with Cathay Pacific, while Gold, Platinum and Platinum One cardholders and other Oneworld Sapphire and Emerald members also enjoy perks such as airport lounge access, priority check-in and priority boarding.
Also read: Cathay Pacific opens new The Pier First Class lounge
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Chris is a a former contributor to Executive Traveller.
Qantas - Qantas Frequent Flyer
20 Nov 2011
Total posts 186
In a future where an invigorated Qantas international has many 787s in its fleet I wonder if this demand might see a competitor on this route...possibly with onwards flights to mainland China even....in the mean time this is great news. Shame about the partner earn rates on QFF these days
Virgin Australia - Velocity Rewards
24 Aug 2011
Total posts 780
For QF to compete they would need to match frequency and product. Won't happen. Onwards flights to China wouldn't work as the ATC holdups in the mainland would destroy OTP for the HKG-ADL sector.
Qantas - Qantas Frequent Flyer
20 Nov 2011
Total posts 186
I would argue that the new J product and the existing W and Y products are very competitive. As for schedule...well QF have less than half the frequency of CX from BNE/SYD/MEL yet still compete and have been profitable.
I take your point on ATC delays in mainland China...it's a shame they can't cooperate with Dragonair for that. How bad are Beijing/Chongqing/chengdu etc?
Qantas - Qantas Frequent Flyer
28 Feb 2014
Total posts 143
IMO... The reason QF beats CX out of BNE is becuase of their horrible timetable of the 9am flight going VIA cairns or the 12:50am direct flight...
Qantas - Qantas Frequent Flyer
20 Nov 2011
Total posts 186
Sounds like schedule prob is winning there! There is obviously also fairly sufficient point to point traffic from the eastern Seaboard, Qantas are now increasing their schedule. I can't believe I'm about to mention Perth, but if Adelaide is seeing strong demand, surely Perth must be too...I guess we shall see in time!
24 Apr 2014
Total posts 269
Yes QF points very restricted on Cathay, just came back from Hong Kong with Cathay and found my booking class got me zero on QF, so opened up an Asia miles account and got the points that way.
12 Dec 2012
Total posts 1030
"possibly with onwards flights to mainland China"
Not allowed to. Air Services Agreement with Mainland China doesn't mention via rights.
Air Services Agreement with Hong Kong doesn't allow via or beyond rights into Mainland China.
Australian carriers are allowed via rights to/from HKG through Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand (limit of 7/week for each city pair)
Australian carriers are allowed byond rights from HKG to s in Thailand, Singapore, Japan, Korea, 1 point in Europe and 1 point in the UK, limited to 3 per week to Europe (Germany, France, Scandinavia, Italy, Netherlands or Switzerland) and 7 per week to the UK.
Cathay Pacific - Asia Miles
01 Feb 2015
Total posts 111
Haven't the AUS goverment capped CX's flights into AUS???
Lufthansa - Miles & More
29 Jul 2014
Total posts 181
Only to BNE,PER,MELBOURNE,SYD
12 Dec 2012
Total posts 1030
Most Air Services Agreements with Australia only cap flights or seats flown to/from PER/MEL/BNE/SYD (sometimes inculding AVV).
The HKG agreement is 70 flights/week max to the above ports. Flights to ports such as ADL, OOL, CNS and CBR are unlimited.
Thai Airways International - Royal Orchid Plus
15 Jan 2013
Total posts 457
i have yet to try them out of Adelaide.Shame they are not a Velocity Partner with Virgin Australia as this would be an incentive to use them to HKG as bad as immigration returning home is especially if it's a day when there is a plane from either Bali or Kuala Lumpur arriving before the CATHAY FLIGHTS.
Qantas - Qantas Frequent Flyer
25 Mar 2014
Total posts 219
I am regular on this service.
It is an awesome service in my books due to the scheduled times.
Always quality service on board.
I will continue to support CX even if QF did offer something similar
Their IFE, Inflight service and food has been years ahead of QF international in my books and the lounges are the best in the world
06 Feb 2014
Total posts 10
Glad to see CX increasing its flights to Adelaide - the timing during the summer is perfect. They should also increase its Cairns flights (I know there's a cap on the Brisbane flights; but perhaps they could do Hong Kong > Darwin > Cairns > Hong Kong / Hong Kong > Cairns > Darwin > Hong Kong twice or three times a week; or maybe adding Hong Kong > Cairns > Gold Coast > Hong Kong and Hong Kong > Gold Coast > Cairns > Hong Kong route.
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