Virgin Blue shuffles the deck

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Wednesday, 18 August 2010

Australia's Virgin Blue Group of Airlines has announced the first phase of a network review that includes Pacific Blue withdrawing its New Zealand domestic services and instead expanding as an international medium-haul airline with operations across the Tasman, the Pacific Islands and South East Asia.

Virgin Blue has lost money contesting the New Zealand domestic market since 2007 and the losses had to stop, said Virgin Blue Australia's chief executive John Borghetti.

"We had to pull out of domestic New Zealand. There is no prospect of returning a profit. To continue to lose tens of millions of dollars over the next three years or so is just not an option for us," Borghetti said.

As part of the review, international arm V Australia will be dedicated to long haul services that suit its B777 fleet.

From 19 October, V Australia's Sydney - Los Angeles schedules will change to a morning ex Sydney departure and capacity on V Australia medium haul flights to Fiji will be taken up by Pacific Blue.

From December, V Australia will operate daily services between Sydney and Los Angeles and also operate an additional service weekly between Melbourne and Johannesburg, South Africa.

Other changes affect the group's services to Indonesia and Thailand and domestically in Australia.