With Fortress Australia finally deciding to open up, Qantas has found itself to be in a hectic period. With the Australian government giving the green light to open up for Australia’s vaccinated citizens and residents, for now, various states are currently in the process of unwinding the stiff quarantine requirements that Australia has had for a long while. Qantas earlier announced flights between Sydney and Delhi to be launched in early December 2021, and Air India beat them to a route launch by (re)launching their connectivity between Sydney and Delhi in November 2021. With the launch of the Sydney – Delhi connections, Qantas says they saw the fastest booking surge for flights leaving Australia since the airline announced its international restart plans in August.

Qantas launching flights between Melbourne and Delhi

Qantas has accelerated launching its international network and will be launching many new flights in the coming days. Qantas made many announcements this morning, but one of the most significant ones from an Indian perspective is launching a new Melbourne – Delhi non-stop flight, which is a new route for Qantas altogether. Same-day connections will also be available from Brisbane, Sydney and Canberra.

Over the past 12 months, the airline has operated more than 50 repatriation flights from India on behalf of the Australian Government to bring Australians home.

Qantas will launch flights between Melbourne and Delhi from December 22, 2021, with four flights per week.  Qantas is only launching these flights for about four months so far, till March 2022.

The flights between Melbourne and Delhi will be operated with a technical stop at Adelaide, and the flights from Delhi to Sydney will be non-stop. An Airbus A330, with 28 lie-flat business class seats and 269 economy class seats, will operate this route. Here is a look at the A330 experience onboard Qantas flights.

Of course, many people are wondering why they are not getting the Boeing 787s of Qantas, but for a temporary route, a newer aircraft might not be the best idea for now.

The flights will be operated as per the following schedule every Tuesday/Wednesday/Friday/Sunday:

• QF69 will take off from Melbourne at 09:25 am, arriving in Delhi via Adelaide at 06:10 pm. (all times local).
• QF70 will take off from Delhi at 7:55 pm local time and arrive in Melbourne non-stop at 1:35 pm the following afternoon.

What is vital is that there are no air bubble agreements between India and Australia, which has been the only way that commercial flights are being offered.

Second, and critical piece of news is that Australia is only going quarantine free to their citizens and PRs and their immediate families and parents only, so this flight will only help them visit their family in India and head back. Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison has said it’s possible that Australia would reopen to international visitors before the end of the year.

All passengers on Qantas and Jetstar international flights (aged 12 years and older) will be required to be fully vaccinated with a TGA-approved vaccine (unless they have an exemption).

• As part of Federal Government requirements, customers on these flights will also be required to return a negative COVID test from an approved PCR testing site within 72 hours of departure.

Bottomline

Qantas is launching a direct flight between Delhi and Melbourne on December 22, 2021. The flight will operate four times a week initially.

What do you make of this ramp-up of flights between India and Australia by Qantas?

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