Dubai-based carrier Emirates has announced an interline partnership with SkyTeam Alliance member Kenya Airways.
By way of the partnership, customers of both airlines can access new destinations on each other’s network with a single itinerary.
Emirates passengers can fly to 28 destinations on the Kenya Airways network using Nairobi as the gateway to destinations such as Nampula, Bangui, Bujumbara, Kigali, Dzaoudzi, Lubumbashi, Kinshasa, Kilimanjaro, Juba, and Zanzibar, among other regional points across Africa.
Additionally, Emirates passengers travelling via Dubai can also book a single ticket itinerary from or to Mombasa.
Likewise, Kenya Airways passengers travelling from Nairobi and Mombasa can access the Emirates’ network and seamlessly connect through Dubai to 23 destinations including Singapore, Tokyo, Bangkok, Ahmedabad, Beirut, Hong Kong, Jakarta, and Seoul, among others.
Adnan Kazim, chief commercial officer of Emirates, said, “We are pleased to ink our first partnership with Kenya’s flag carrier. Kenya is a strategic gateway in our Africa network, and this new interline agreement will enhance connectivity for Emirates’ customers and provide them more travel choices across the continent.”
Julius Thairu, chief commercial and customer officer at Kenya Airways, added, “This partnership will provide the ideal gateway for our customers as we seek to increase our connectivity between Africa and the Middle East through Emirates’ hub in Dubai.”
Emirates commenced operations to Kenya with the launch of flights between Nairobi and Dubai in 1995, and since then has grown the route to 14 weekly flights, having flown over 5 million passengers through the years.
Kenya Airways recently launched direct flights between Mombasa and Dubai offering customers four weekly flights. The flight from Moi International airport in Mombasa marked the second hub, the other being its Jomo Kenyatta International airport through which the carrier connects passengers directly to the UAE.
KQ currently operates ten weekly flights to Dubai from Nairobi using a mix of B737-800 and the Dreamliner B787-800.
Across its global network, Emirates carried 43.6 million passengers in the year ending March 31, 2023, with seat capacity up by 78 per cent.
