Virgin Australia has announced that it will end flying between Cairns and Tokyo (Haneda). The final flight is takes off on 24 February 2025 and comes less than two years after commencing the service.
According to the airline there has been a slow recovery of inbound visitors travelling from Japan to Australia. As this remains remains ~up to 35 per cent below pre-COVID levels they have decided the route is not commercially sustainable.
It is possible that the value of the yen is one factor contributing to these poor figures. The yen is now 40 per cent lower against the Australian dollar than it was in 2019. This weakness is forecast to continue, and as a result inbound tourism from Japan was not expected to recover any time soon.
In addition to the cancellation of services after 24 February, Virgin will be consolidating services between September and November 2024. During the off-peak period it will operate six services a week between Cairns and Tokyo.
According to Virgin Australia Chief Transformation and Strategy Officer, Alistair Hartley
We know this is disappointing news, and we are sorry for the impact this decision will have on those guests booked to travel with us from 24 February 2025.
Virgin Australia customers and Velocity Frequent Flyer members will be able to book seamless flights with ANA from just about anywhere in Australia to Japan directly on our website. We will also continue to provide Velocity Points earn, Rewards Seats and loyalty benefits on eligible ANA flights.
Customers with bookings
According to Virgin, there are about 2,000 customers have bookings after 24 February 2025. As a result, Virgin Australia is offering these customers a refund.
Virgin will contact send emails to customers that made their bookings directly with Virgin. These emails should be sent within the next 24 hours to allow Virgin to organise the refund.
For anyone that has booked through a travel agent, Virgin say to contact the agent for a refund or to make other plans.
A Brief History
While Virgin have only been operating this service since last year, there is a longer history to this operation. As Japan was preparing for the Olympic Games in 2020, two slots became available for flights between Australia and Haneda Airport. While both Qantas and Virgin Australia bid for the slots, they were granted one slot each.
At the time, Virgin Australia planned to operate a daily Airbus A330 service between Brisbane to Haneda, commencing in March 2020. Those plans got put on hold as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic. During that time, Virgin went through an administration process and no longer operates widebody aircraft.
Eventually, Virgin was given a ‘use it or lose it’ ultimatum. As a result, they chose to deploy a 737-Max aircraft onto the route. This was obviously not an ideal solution as 7 hours is a long time to be flying on a 737.
What happens now?
Virgin Flights
Virgin has a codeshare and frequent flyer partnership with Japan’s ANA. Through this partnership, Virgin puts its flight number of 17 services a week between Australia and Japan.
Guests travelling on ANA flights will receive seamless baggage transfer and Velocity loyalty benefits, including Points earn. Similarly, Velocity members will continue to be able to redeem Points for Reward Seats on ANA services.
The Haneda Slot
As Virgin will no longer be operating the service, it is likely that will have to return the slot. Once this happens, the IASC will make it available to other airlines. Realistically, this would be taken up within the Qantas group – either by Qantas itself, or Jetstar. One would assume that Qantas will be putting some thought into this
The Aircraft
As a result of withdrawing from Japan, a 737-Max will be freed up. Virgin says that it will redeploy the aircraft onto its domestic network,
