A second United Arab Emirates airline will fire-up services between Australia and London, with Emirates confirming its planned restart of scheduled flights to/from Sydney and Melbourne, starting 21 May 2020. Earlier in the week, Etihad Airways revealed its intention to begin services on Friday 15 May.

Singapore Changi Airport has been named as the World’s Best Airport for the eighth consecutive year by customers at the Skytrax 2020 World Airport Awards.

Etihad Airways will operate a regularly scheduled service from Melbourne to London Heathrow via Abu Dhabi, effective 15 May. A few days later, from 21 May, the Gulf carrier will also introduce services from London Heathrow to Melbourne via Abu Dhabi. Tickets can be purchased now.

Lufthansa Group has earmarked June for a resumption to “significantly more destinations” than current schedules, which have been heavily impacted by the COVID-19 travel downturn.

Qatar Airways will begin a phased approach to expanding its network in line with passenger demand evolution and the expected relaxation of entry restrictions around the world. Having maintained flights to at least 30 destinations where possible during the COVID-19 crisis and to most continents, helping to take over one million people home, the airline has been closely monitoring global passenger flows and booking trends to confidently begin planning the gradual reintroduction of additional flights and destinations to its network.

The South African Government will develop a revamped international airline with a fresh business model and direction as the demise of the country’s flag carrier, South African Airways, is compounded by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Virgin Australia has withdrawn a controversial proposal to enable it and other airlines to collective bargain with airports as part of a wider application before the ACCC.

Virgin Australia has been lambasted by domestic airports for a proposed collective bargaining agreement it is seeking to adopt in the face of the coronavirus pandemic.

Sunshine Coast Airport’s new runway is nearing completion with a launch date of mid-June 2020 flagged for its debut.

Vietnam Airlines has enhanced its Flight Pass program offering to provide passengers with increased convenience and benefits.

Gold Coast Airport has been forced to suspend operations from Friday 10 April as regular commercial passenger services to the region dry up.

United Airlines has introduced a series of changes to assist customers and MileagePlus members, including extending members current MileagePlus Premier status through January 2022. At a minimum, all MileagePlus Premier members will retain the status they earned for 2020, through January 2022*. In addition, for the 2021 status year, United is reducing thresholds for Premier qualification by 50% for each status level, to make reaching an even higher status tier easier.