UAE's favourite airline, Emirates has just landed Porto Airport. The first of many!

The maiden flight of Emirate's Boeing 777-220 landed at Francisco Sá Carneiro in Porto at 2.15pm, today, 2 July. This will be the first of many as UAE's favourite airline, Emirates will operate four direct weekly flights between Porto and Dubai, "to start", as enhanced by Thierry Aucoc, Emirate's Senior Vice President Commercial Operations Europe and Russian Federation, during the welcoming ceremony that followed the flight's landing.

"This is happening because the city is developing extremely fast, we are talking about an area now of 2.5 million inhabitants". Thierry Aucoc also pinpointed that "it is an area that covers the North of Portugal but the catchman areas will have also a role to play, with Galicia and this part of Spain, where we know that the passenger will come to Porto if they want to fly".

In addition, this direct connection to Dubai "already attracts some 16 million visitors a year" and "it will bring the city of Porto and the entire Northern Region closer to south-west Asian markets, as well as to Australia, the region of the Indian Ocean and southwestern Africa", guaranteed by the extensive Emirate's route network.

The first flight ceremony kicked off with the traditional fire brigade salutation and when the airplane settled down, 302 passengers (38 Executive and 264 Economy class) exited the aircraft as this was a fully booked flight.

Among the passengers was Councillor for Economy, Tourism and Trade of Porto City Hall, Ricardo Valente who returned from Dubai following a official visit to present Porto as a tourism and business destination.

José Luís Arnaut, chairman of the ANA- Aeroportos de Portugal- board of management highlighted that the fact "that Porto is now a part of Emirate's route network strongly increases the airport's connectivity and links it to one of the world's largest hubs". 

 

"I especially want to thank the strong and continued support of Mayor of Porto, Rui Moreira, regarding the growth of Porto Airport", he concluded.

According to PressTur, data from ANA/Vinci, the concession company for Portuguese airports shows that Porto was the airport that grew more strongly in 2018, which is an increase of 10.7% compared to 2017.

Porto airport had already achieved several milestones in the aviation market, having handled 6.900.000 passengers in 2014, eight million in 2015 and 9.300 million in 2016. Porto Airport had clearly surpassed this threshold in 2017, with a traffic of more than 10 million passengers per year.

For 2018, the result of a fast passenger traffic growth in just one year is the 11,939 million-passenger mark in commercial flights, representing an increase of 22% in take-off and landings.

Air traffic continues to grow in Porto due to increased visibility of the city in a level more commensurate with the growing global interest in Porto as a destination for tourists, entrepreneurs and students.

Virtually all airlines have increased their flights and passengers in Porto this past year, including TAP, TAAG, KLM, Air France, British Arline Monarch, Royal Air Maroc, Lufthansa, Ryanair, EasyJet, Wizz Air, EuroWings and United Airlines, just to mention a few.

Porto Airport was chosen by ACI - Airports Council International as the best in Europe among airports under 5 to 15 million passengers category in March 2017. The award follows the Airport Service Quality (ASQ) study, the leading worldwide benchmark in the Evaluation of Passenger Satisfaction - 2016 Airport Service Quality (ASQ) Awards.