Big news from Emirates today. They announced daily service between Newark and Athens on a Boeing 777-300ER jet starting 12 March 2017. The Emirates press release details the flight as an extension of their Dubai-Athens route.
The flights will operate as follows:
EK209 departing DXB 10:50 arriving ATH 14:25
EK209 departing ATH 16:40 arriving EWR 22:00
EK210 departing EWR 23:45 arriving ATH 15:05 (next day)
EK210 departing ATH 17:10 arriving DXB 23:50
This flight is fairly big news for a few reasons. Athens is a historically low-yield market and most of the time service runs seasonally from the NYC metro area. For hubbed airlines which fly to Athens (United and Delta primarily) this is a big competitive upheaval, since Emirates will be operating their very nice 777-300ER (compared to the older 767s which most domestic carriers use for the route) which will have 8 First Class suites, 42 angled lie-flat seats in business, and 304 coach seats.
Basically it should offer a nicer product at a similar price to the US carriers. Knowing Emirates, I wouldn’t be surprised to see them undercut prices a bit to drive demand.
While this is good news for consumers I think this will only fan the flames of the battle between US and Middle East carriers. That said, if anyone from NYC wants to head to Greece this is a good opportunity to do so!
Are you excited about the new service? Do you plan to travel to Greece on it? Leave me some comments below!
I saw The Flight Deal show fares at just under $600 for this route. Do you think this could impact fares in any other US markets? Athens has been on my bucket list, but is traditionally out of my budget.