- Friday, February 28, 2025
The British airline kicked off its operations at Islamabad airport in December 2020 with seven weekly flights.
By: Shubham Ghosh
BRITISH carrier Virgin Atlantic on Sunday (9) wrapped up its operations in Pakistan with its last flight taking off from Islamabad for London’s Heathrow Airport.
A spokesman for the Civil Aviation Authority confirmed this saying the final flight left from Islamabad International Airport to London’s Heathrow Airport at 8 am local time.
The British airline kicked off its operations at Islamabad airport in December 2020 with seven weekly flights.
Initially, it operated four flights to Manchester and three to Heathrow Airport, Pakistan’s Dawn newspaper reported on Monday (10).
Later, the airline reduced its services to only three weekly flights to Heathrow Airport.
The report added that Virgin Atlantic provided the best air travel services to customers between Islamabad and London.
“As we continue to ramp up our flying programme in 2023, we’ve taken the opportunity to review our entire network and decided to make a few changes,” a Virgin Atlantic spokesperson said earlier this year.
The official expressed regret for taking the “difficult decision” to suspend the services between London’s Heathrow and Pakistan.
“Since commencing operations in December 2020, we have been proud to offer choice for customers travelling between London and Manchester in the United Kingdom, and Islamabad and Lahore in Pakistan. During that time, we have also provided important cargo capacity, as well as delivering vital medical supplies,” the spokesperson said.
“This is not a decision we have taken lightly, and we’d like to apologise for any inconvenience caused. We would like to wholeheartedly thank everyone in Pakistan; our customers, teams, partners and the authorities for their support over the past two years,” he added.
It was not clear if the decision was linked to Pakistan’s economic woes and their fallout on businesses.
In February, News18 reported that the British carrier decided to suspend its operation in Islamabad and Lahore due to technical and ground reasons. It cited sources as saying that exorbitant taxes and zero services by Pakistan’s civil aviation authorities may have led to the suspension.
(With agency inputs)
