Australia, U.S. to start open-skies pact talks

[serfty]

Australia, U.S. to start open-skies pact talks | Markets | Markets News | Reuters

CANBERRA, Jan 2 (Reuters) - Australia and the United States will start talks on an open-skies aviation deal within the next six weeks to open up the lucrative trans-Pacific route between the two countries, Australia's government said on Wednesday.

Transport Minister Anthony Albanese gave approval for formal talks to start in Washington next month, in a move which could see more U.S. carriers fly to Australia via ports in Asia, such as Tokyo.

A spokesman for Albanese said the meetings would be held between Feb. 12-14. ...

 

[simongr]

Interesting - would be great for some of us if AA flew the route - could burn up some of those eVIPs

 

[Yada Yada]

AA used to fly to Australia. I guess being OW partners there was just no point competing with QF.

 

[Mwenenzi]

Any Australian majority owned airline or US majority owned airline can now have 4 USA-Aust return flights without Government approval. That’s how Hawaiian started their service. QF & UA have rights to more than 4 return flights. The airline wanting to run a new service has to convince the aviation safety authorities they have the aviation systems in place to run a long over water service (that is different from Government approval). This approval was not a problem for Hawaiian, as they do that every day to the US mainland. The relevant document “Register of Available capacity” in pdf is on the Au gov web site.

These new negotiations are in part for Virgin who want daily Aus-USA return flight services (at least 7 per week). The other airlines on the route may object. Flights via a 3rd country need the countries approval as well. Link to freedoms of the air here