KARACHI: Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) has decided to offer two weekly direct flights to Australia, cutting travel time between the two countries by around one-third, a spokesperson for the agency said.
Abdullah Hafeez Niazi said the national flag carrier intends to operate the flights initially from Karachi and Lahore to the port city of Sydney but may later expand the coverage to Islamabad as well.
Direct flights would shorten the travel duration to 12:30-13 hours. Since there are no direct flights operating between Pakistan and Australia at the moment, the journey takes 34 to 35 hours, excluding stopovers.
PIA has conducted a feasibility study that concluded the routes would be beneficial to the airline.
A 2019 report from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) showed the Pakistani population residing in Australia stood at 91,000, up from 84,000 in the previous year.
A breakdown of the data showed a majority of that population lived in the state of New South Wales — of which Sydney is the capital — followed by Victoria, Western Australia, Queensland, South Australia, Tasmania, Northern Territory, and Australian Capital Territory which houses the capital of Canberra.
If the operations between the two nations begin, it would happen for the first time, Niazi said.
The proposed operations may commence in late March or early April “if all goes well”, a report in The News quoted him as saying. The airline is yet to receive authorisation from the Civil Aviation Safety Authority of that nation.
The airline has worked out its strategy and completed its homework, Niazi said.
