South African Airways is expanding its routes with operations to Perth and Sao Paulo to kick off on 31 March, per Airline Ratings.
The state-owned airline, which went into bankruptcy during the pandemic and has been slowly restarting services, will also restart operations to European and US cities later this year.
However, the new routes have not yet been loaded in the airline’s reservation system.
South African Airways plans to use Airbus A330s for its two long-haul routes to Sao Paulo, the airline’s interim chief commercial officer, Tebogo Tsimane told a Travel News Weekly webcast last week.
The airline is looking to kick off flights to Frankfurt, London, Washington and New York with A350s this year.
Tsimane said that “the routes that we’ve picked for this year are the routes that will be easier and quicker for us to start.”
Following a US$570 million bailout in September 2021, the airline was left with a small fleet of six aircraft, down from its pre-COVID fleet of 44 aircraft.
South African Airways has grown to a fleet of nine and plans to have 12 by the end of the year.
