Emirates to launch Dublin service

Emirates Executive Vice-Chairman, Maurice Flanagan, announced the carrier plans to launch services to Ireland, with visiting friends and relatives' traffic seen as central to sustaining the service (Arabian Business, 19-May-2010). Aer Lingus launched Dublin-Dubai service in 2005 under CEO, Dermot Mannion, a former Emirates' President of Group Support Services. The service was later suspended.

Emirates: "That is something which we do keep looking at. Ireland would work for us. It didn't work for Aer Lingus because Dermot's model was a low cost one and it wouldn't work. Ireland would be good as there are good family connections between Ireland and Australia, which the VFR traffic itself would be quite substantial. We can't do everything but we will be there sooner or later," Maurice Flanagan, Executive Vice Chairman. Source: Arabian Business, 19-May-2010.