LAUNCHING of direct Manila-Toronto flights gives Philippine Airlines (PAL) a competitive advantage, an aviation market intelligence provider said.
Flag carrier Philippine Airlines launched this month its direct Manila-Toronto flights, replacing previous flights operated via Vancouver. Its return flight was the first ultra-long polar flight from Toronto nonstop to Manila, the first crossing of the Polar region by a Filipino airline.
“By introducing a nonstop option in the Toronto-Manila market, PAL has gained a competitive advantage over the nine airlines that offer a one-stop product. Several of these airlines offered similar, or shorter, total transit times than PAL before PAL introduced a nonstop service,” CAPA-Centre for Aviation said on its Web site.
For the Manila-Toronto flight, PAL used a Boeing 777-300ER that crossed Canada, Greenland, the Arctic Circle, Russia, Mongolia and parts of China.
The Manila-Toronto route is now one of the 20 longest routes in the world, with a block time of 16 hours and 30 minutes on the westbound leg, and 14 hours and 40 minutes on the eastbound leg. The nonstop flight is 4.5 hours shorter than PAL’s previous one-stop service, which had a total transit time of 21 hours on the westbound sector.
Other airlines which offer the Manila-Toronto route are Cathay Pacific Airways Limited (via Hong Kong), and China Eastern Airlines Corporation Limited (via Shanghai).
PAL plans to follow up with another polar crossing service on a longer nonstop route, over 17 hours, within the second half of 2018, from Manila to New York (JFK Airport) and from New York to Manila, using the A350. — P.P.C. Marcelo
