Emirates' first Airbus A350-900 aircraft will make its debut flight to Edinburgh 12 days earlier than previously announced, on January 3, after the airline took delivery of the wide-body on Monday.
Flight EK23 will leave Dubai at 2.50pm and arrive in the Scottish capital at 7.05pm local time. The return flight, EK24, will depart from Edinburgh at 8.40pm and arrive in Dubai at 08.05am local time on the following day.
“The advancement of the scheduled service reinforces Emirates’ commitment to providing customers with enhanced travel experiences and greater comfort on board,” the airline said on Tuesday.
Emirates resumed flights to Edinburgh on November 5 for the first time since 2020, using a Boeing 777, which will be replaced by the much-anticipated A350.
The airline also serves Glasgow with a daily Airbus A380 flight, offering customers 14 weekly flights to and from Scotland. Emirates serves eight destinations in the UK.
The Dubai-based airline will introduce its A350 aircraft on routes to eight other destinations – Mumbai, Ahmedabad, Kuwait, Bahrain, Colombo, Lyon, Muscat and Bologne – with more to follow, it said.
Emirates took delivery of the A350-900 wide-body jet in Toulouse, France, following months of delays. It is the first new model to join the airline's fleet of Airbus A380s and Boeing 777s since 2008.
The new aircraft, registered as A6-EXA, is the first from an order of 65 A350s. Deliveries were supposed to start in August and continue for the next three and a half years.
The first batch of A350s will be used on short- to medium-haul routes in the Middle East, the GCC, West Asia and Europe, and the second phase will be used on new and existing “mid-sized” markets with ultra-long-haul range such as Adelaide in Australia, Adnan Kazim, deputy president and chief commercial officer of Emirates, told The National in May.
The move will replace the bigger Boeing 777s and Airbus A380s currently on these routes, freeing them up to serve demand on destinations requiring larger capacity, he said.
