Philippine Airlines said it will mount non-stop flights to Brisbane, Australia, India and the US East Coast via the polar route this year.
PAL, the flag carrier led by tycoon Lucio Tan, said it would deploy new Airbus A321 NEOs by February and A350s by June for these international flights.
PAL said that on Dec. 15, a PAL 777 made the first trans-polar flight for a Philippine carrier – a 16.5-hour, non-stop Toronto-Manila flight – preceded by the upgrade of several routes from one-stop to non-stop in 2017: Manila-Doha, Manila-Auckland, Manila-Kuwait and Manila-Jeddah.
PAL received seven airplanes in 2017 including five Bombardier Q400 turboprops for inter-island flights and two Boeing 777-300ERs for long-haul routes.
PAL’s complete fleet of ten 777s now fly to North America and London.
The airline also operated its first international flight to Clark with the arrival of an A321 from Seoul. Other new routes include Seoul-Tagbilaran, Chengdu-Kalibo, Chengdu-Cebu, Manila-Kuala Lumpur, Cebu-Beijing and Cebu-Bangkok.
PAL flies from Clark to Bacolod, Basco, Busuanga, Calbayog, Catarman, Cagayan de Oro, Caticlan, Cebu, Davao, Masbate, Puerto Princesa, Tagbilaran, Virac and Seoul.
From Davao, PAL opened three new routes (Davao to Tagbilaran, Cagayan de Oro and Zamboanga) using the new Q400s.
Ten domestic routes were opened from Cebu – Siargao and Camiguin (new PAL destinations) as well as to Cagayan de Oro, Caticlan, Legazpi, Ozamiz, Puerto Princesa, Surigao, Tacloban and Tagbilaran.
PAL posted a net loss of P3.5 billion in January to September, a significant drop from the P2.96-billion total comprehensive income recognized in the same period in 2016.
Revenues in the nine-month period rose 15.6 percent to P98.63 billion from P85.35 billion a year earlier.