United Airlines will add a quintuplet of new international routes including service to Ghana, two destinations in India, Nigeria, and a second destination in South Africa.
United Airlines Adds Five New International Routes To Africa and India
San Francisco – Bangalore
In what United calls its most-requested international route, new nonstop service between San Francisco and Bangalore will connected Silicon Valley East with Silicon Valley West.
The new route will start in the Spring of 2021 and be operated by a Boeing 787-9.
Chicago – New Delhi
United Airlines will take up the mantle of a long-time, but now abandoned, American Airlines route. Chicago, United notes, has the second highest population of Indian Americans in the United States.
The new service will begin in December 2020 and utilize a 787-9.
Newark – Johannesburg
With South African Airways on life support, United will add daily service between Newark and Johannesburg beginning in Spring 2021. This will complement existing seasonal service to Cape Town. The flight will utilize a 787-9.
Patrick Quayle, United’s Vice President of International Network and Alliances, noted on a press call this morning that United has worked with Boeing to address range issues with this new route on the 787-9.
Washington – Accra
While not a brand new route, United has not served Accra, Ghana since 2012. With a growing Ghanian population in the greater Washington metro area and a more fuel and passenger efficient 787-8 Dreamliner, United hopes this new route will be a success.
The service will operate 3x weekly starting next spring. United will compete with Delta on the route, which offers service from New York JFK utilizing a 767-300.
Washington – Lagos
United will add service to Lagos, Nigeria from its Washington Dulles hub. Lagos is the largest gateway to west Africa. United operated service between Houston and Lagos for many years, but with the oil market depressed, Washington appeared a more lucrative opportunity.
The service will operate 3x weekly starting next spring utilizing a 787-8. United will compete with Delta on the route, which offers service from New York JFK utilizing a 767-300.
Why Now?
You may be asking yourself, aren’t we in the middle of the pandemic? Addressing that point, Quayle said:
“Now is the right time to take a bold step in evolving our global network to help our customers reconnect with friends, family and colleagues around the world. These new nonstop routes provide shorter travel times and convenient one-stop connections from across the United States, demonstrating United’s continued innovative and forward-looking approach to rebuilding our network to meet the travel needs of our customers.”
During a press call this morning, United’s Chief Communications Officer Josh Earnest, former White House press secretary for Barack Obama, bristled at the idea that United has taken a “conservative” approach to route planning, instead calling it nimble, but opportunistic.
Will these destinations actually take off? Of course it is too early to tell, but even at current demand levels United plans to operate these flights. Earnest also emphasized the increasing value of United’s cargo operation, with over 5,000 cargo flights operating since the pandemic began.
CONCLUSION
My predictions yesterday were not totally off…though I missed a few things. I love that United has gone from not serving Africa to serving four destinations. The new India service will also likely be highly successful, particularly given Air India’s struggles.
What do you make of United’s new international route announcements?
> Read More: United Airlines Adds Two New Long-Haul Routes To Hawaii
image: United Airlines
The Battle of Bangalore is really interesting. UA from SFO and AA from SEA. I predict UA will have much better loads on this and AA will end up abandoning it after a year.
Being in DC, I am sure the Ghana route should do well. For a brief time the old Ghana Airways actually served BWI. Was so strange to see the colorful DC 10’s parked there! The DMV not only has a huge population from Ghana – but also strong business ties to Accra in tech, trade, etc. For many years the Ghana Military also flew aircraft into BWI to transport goods, etc.
Thanks for the write up, Matthew. Any idea why IAH doesn’t get much love from UA with new routes? The last few announcements they haven’t gotten anything. Obviously a lot go into route planning from economics to geography and more but Houston is a major international city with a huge East Asian/Indian population — they’d be well served by more routes to those regions. I worked many years in chemical processing and we had partners in China and Taiwan. When Air China and EVA launched their routes to IAH it was a huge deal. Those flights were always full and and former partners that still fly those routes say they’re typically +90% capacity.
Matthew can probably answer better, but my personal feeling is that the geography of Houston is not conducive for much growth as a hub. It’s strangely positioned in not being able to capture effectively large chunks of heavily populated regions with sensible connections. It does a lot of things good but nothing great.
Even South America, which would seem to be a natural at first glance, you pretty much eliminate the entire east coast from seamless and fast routings. Though they do well with GRU, that is fine given the size of the two cities on point to point and the filler from the west coast. But living in DC as an example I would never consider flying to GRU via IAH as it adds hours to the routing.
Even on domestic coast to coast, a lot of us avoid Houston as a connection from the NE as it adds more time to a routing than, say, ORD, or DEN.
That’s my thought at least. based on my own avoidance of IAH.
And I would also suspect the lack of demand by Oil/Gas customers
Pls I need an accurate information. My fiancee book via justfly and her flight is attached to united flight so when she was bout to fill the Nigeria international travel portal united airline was not among the airlines options.. Does that means united flight won’t be allow to fly into Nigeria?? I am confuse on this. She has her ticket booked with united flight pls help with accurate information… Thanks
United’s flight will not begin until next spring (2021). As such, it is not bookable yet.
“Why now” reads one of the titles in this article. I believe the why is because all routes are losers now so might as well try innovative routes. When times are good, it’s far safer to add a frequency to a winning route than to add a risk new international route since all the safe and profitable international routes have already been tried.
United also flew to Lagos from Washington around 2010-2012
United to serve five cities in Africa? Which five?
Four. JNB, ACC, LOS, CPT
You said five in the article.
I think it’s a good thing, but United Airlines should take a second look at Houston to Lagos Nigeria route. You have more Nigerians in Houston more than any other city in America. Forget about the oil analysis, you will get your airplane filled up with the Houston route. You are going to have passengers from, Houston Dallas and everywhere in the State of Texas and neighboring States
Very welcoming,
Couple of us have business deals in the Washington metropolitan area ,we are excited , welcoming news.
I am so excited about the African routes. I have unfinished “bucket list” visits and a lot of flight credits burning a hole in my account.
They should go Montevideo Uruguay like before
But it was corrected to 4 routes to Africa. And if you add Bangolore, India = 5 routes.
There is certainly a rush to these west african cities because of a large community of Ghanaians and Nigerians but Dakar, Senegal is neglected. There is a very large Senegalese population in the East Coast of the United States but even more important throughout the country.
South African Airways left a big void when it ceased operating its flights out of Washington Dulles. Now it the perfect time to seriously look at filling that void, especially with Senegal’s strong and distinctive control of the Covid-19 pandemic and its longstanding democracy and tourism appeal.
I would have loved a flight to Dakar. Hopefully one day…
Well, let’s keep on spelling out the socio economic benefits of exploiting a Washington-Dakar route. Hopefully this will soon result in new flights to Senegal. Either way, Matthew, you are invited and will be most welcome.
Thanks for coming back to Nigeria. We have missed you so much
Thanks for the new development. I appreciate. Nigeria is going to be one of the busiest routes once this pandemic issue is lessened.
UA should have added Medellin, Colombia also in their routes. Madeline is South America’s silicon Valley. I think they could have taken out one flight from IAH to BOG, from 2 flights a day, and have added SFO to MDE Second flight from IAH to BOG could be seasonal, like they have EWR to BOG at present.
I would have liked to have seen this too.
Splendid idea for United’s Africa routes comeback.
It will be exciting to have a good competition for Delta and fill the vacuum from the absence of SAA.
If UA is serious this time they need to do their homework very well. The Nigerian market is highly volatile and very competitive. I was LH Senior Key Account Manager in Nigeria and was part of the team working with the UA Sales Team in Lagos, ill not divulge a lot here. There is a potential market for UA in Nigeria, many Nigerians reside in the DMV area, UA also need to make sure that they have good connectivity between DC/IAH, DC/DFW, DC/JFK, and DC/PHL If all these City pairs are considered during pricing and SLF(Seat Load Factor), they will do fine, but if UA focus is the DMV, then they need to think twice.
Secondly, UA have your own sales team don’t depend on Star Alliance, and get a Nigerian aviation Sales veteran, If you are using a GSA please choose wisely. I love competition, go to that market with a sustainable long term strategy, then you will have a chunk of American Market
Very good i think they should add route to Dakar
United closes all international bases (except London) and adds international routes at the same time?
This feels like a blow in the face of the loyal international employees that loose their work October 1st.
Are crews from virus-battered US even allowed to enter these new destinations?
What happened to UAL’s once friendly skies?
Good point Mark.