Emirates on Saturday said it resumed operations after its flights were temporarily suspended earlier in the day following disruption caused by debris from intercepted missiles over the UAE.
The airline instructed passengers who have confirmed bookings for Saturday afternoon's flights to proceed to the airport, it said in a statement on X. This includes passengers transiting in Dubai if their connecting flights are also operating it said.
Emirates resumed operations after it briefly suspended flights “until further notice” for about 30 minutes when it urged passengers not to go to the airport.
Dubai International Airport (DXB), the world’s busiest hub for international travel, also temporarily suspended operations.
In lock-step with home carrier Emirates, DXB later said it “partially resumed” operations on Saturday with some flights operating out of DXB and Dubai's second hub Al Maktoum International Airport (DWC).
Emirates' planes bound for Dubai were in a holding pattern on Saturday morning, FlightRadar showed. This came after Dubai authorities dealt with a “minor incident” resulting from falling debris from an interception by air defence systems, the Dubai Media Office said.
The brief disruption happened a day after Emirates said it expects to fully resume its network operations in the coming days, following a week-long suspension in commercial scheduled flights during the Iran attacks.
Emirates has not yet disclosed the financial cost of the week-long pause in its commercial operations.
Abu Dhabi-based Etihad Airways said on Friday it plans to resume a limited schedule of flights starting on March 6 operating between the UAE capital and destinations across the Middle East, Europe and Asia.
It plans to operate about 70 destinations to and from Abu Dhabi between March and March 19, it said.
Qatar Airways has said it will operate repatriation flights on Saturday after the country's civil authority was able to operate a safe air corridor.
'Big scare' at the airport
A Dubai resident flying through DXB this morning describes being
"We had a big scare morning," he said.
Recovery scenarios
Analysts said that the Gulf airlines are well-positioned to recover from the crisis.
“Recovery to normal level of operations can happen within a week after airspace closures are removed,” Raman Singla, director of corporates at Fitch Ratings, told The National.
“The financial impact from a longer crisis depends upon how much liquidity an airline has or can procure during the period of operational curtailment,” he said. “This is because an airline can still incur 50 per cent to 60 per cent of costs that it used to have when operating regularly.”
