Some British Airways flights to bypass London stop
Barbara De Lollis, USA TODAY, 1/9/2008 (excerpted)
British Airways next summer will start offering premium, non-stop service between New York and Europe, bypassing its London Heathrow base.
To do so, London-based BA is launching a subsidiary airline called OpenSkies that will fly daily from New York to Brussels and Paris Charles de Gaulle. It's primarily aimed at the growing number of trans-Atlantic business travelers.
The plan is to launch service in June with a single plane, with the goal of adding a second within six months. By the end of 2009, the airline plans to fly six Boeing 757s from BA's current fleet.
The airline still needs regulatory approvals from European Commission and U.S. authorities, which could alter its planned start date.
It also needs landing rights in New York. OpenSkies will fly out of either Newark or John F. Kennedy, and it remains unclear which service — Paris or Brussels — will be started first.
The aircraft will be configured to carry just 82 passengers in three classes of service, vs. about 200 passengers in the typical configuration.
The carrier will offer a handheld video system for in-flight entertainment. The most expensive cabin will have 24 seats that unfold into 6-foot-long flat beds. The cheapest cabin will have just five rows containing 30 seats.
OpenSkies will compete against European airlines such as Lufthansa and KLM, as well as U.S. airlines such as United and American.
The new airline owes its name to the Open Skies treaty approved last year by the European Union and the United States. Among other things, the agreement lets European airlines for the first time fly between the USA and airports outside their home countries.
OpenSkies passengers will be able to earn BA miles. Dale Moss, the BA executive who will run OpenSkies, said the carrier will rely on BA for substitute airplanes if problems arise with its small fleet.
In the future, OpenSkies plans to fly to other business centers, including Amsterdam, Frankfurt, Milan, Madrid, Zurich and Geneva.
Moss wouldn't speculate about fares, but says the airline will operate with low costs, and offer premium service. "We just bring to the table a very different product, a different price point and the heritage of BA," he says.
The Open Skies treaty takes effect in a few months, freeing U.S. and European airlines to cross the Atlantic without government-imposed limits on where they land. Continental, Northwest, US Airways, Delta and Air France are among carriers that have announced new trans-Atlantic routes as a result of the agreement.