Virgin Australia Delays Sydney-Canberra Restart Again

Link Airways will operate flights from Sydney to Canberra on behalf of Virgin Australia
Link Airways will (eventually) operate flights from Sydney to Canberra on behalf of Virgin Australia.

Virgin Australia has pushed back the resumption of direct flights between Sydney and Canberra – a route that it hasn’t served for almost two years.

In early December 2021, Virgin announced that it would return to the Sydney-Canberra route in partnership with Link Airways from 30 January 2022. The flights would be marketed by Virgin Australia, but operated by Link Airways using 34-seater Saab 340 aircraft.

It was announced that Link Airways would operate the route up to nine times per day on behalf of Virgin Australia under the new agreement.

Unfortunately, it seems there isn’t yet sufficient demand for Virgin to make this work – even using aircraft that seat only 34 passengers.

In mid-January, Virgin pushed back its launch date for the new Canberra-Sydney services from 30 January to 14 February 2022. This has now been pushed back even further to at least 21 March 2022. It is possible that this date could change again in the future.

All Virgin Canberra-Sydney flights prior to 20 March 2022 have been cancelled. Passengers with affected bookings are being offered alternative flights via Melbourne or a full refund. They are not being offered rebooking onto direct flights on other airlines.

Australian Frequent Flyer understands that Virgin Australia still intends to recommence its Sydney-Canberra service in partnership with Link Airways at some point, but that the schedule will continue to be updated in line with demand.

Demand on many routes to and from Canberra, particularly the Canberra-Sydney route, is currently impacted by Australian Public Service Commission guidance discouraging public servants from unnecessary travel during the COVID-19 Omicron wave.

The normally lucrative Canberra-Sydney route is currently served by QantasLink and Rex. Rex launched services in April 2021 after Virgin Australia cancelled previous plans to relaunch services on the route in early 2021 with double-daily Boeing 737-700 flights.

Rex initially said when it launched services that it would fly between Canberra and Sydney up to 10 times per day “if the patronage is good”. As of February 2022, Rex is currently running two flights per day.

Until April 2020, Virgin Australia operated up to nine daily flights between Sydney and Canberra using ATR 72 aircraft operated by Virgin Australia Regional Airlines. These aircraft are no longer a part of Virgin’s fleet.

Virgin Australia used to operate 9x daily ATR72 flights between Sydney & Canberra.
Virgin Australia used to operate 9x daily ATR72 flights between Sydney & Canberra. Photo: Matt Graham.

 

Other Virgin Australia routes are also impacted by Omicron

Virgin Australia has also recently had to scale back many of its existing routes due to suppressed demand and a lack of available staff during the Omicron outbreak. This sadly includes flights to Fiji, Virgin’s only current international destination.

Jayne Hrdlicka at Virgin's Sydney-Nadi relaunch event.
Virgin Australia CEO Jayne Hrdlicka cuts the ribbon at Virgin’s Sydney-Nadi relaunch event in December 2021. Photo: Virgin Australia.

Virgin only resumed flights to Nadi in mid-December of 2021, but the route was temporarily suspended from late January due to reduced demand relating to COVID-19.

Virgin currently plans to resume flights to Fiji on 10 March 2022. Impacted passengers have been contacted and moved onto alternative services, where possible.

 

Join the discussion on the Australian Frequent Flyer forum: Virgin CBR-SYD flights restarting

The editor of Australian Frequent Flyer, Matt's passion for travel has taken him to over 90 countries… with the help of frequent flyer points, of course!
Matt's favourite destinations (so far) are Germany, Brazil & Kazakhstan. His interests include economics, aviation & foreign languages, and he has a soft spot for good food and red wine.

You can connect with Matt by posting on the Australian Frequent Flyer community forum and tagging @AFF Editor.
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Yes, been this way for a while. I had Feb 11 flights cancelled and kept looking for a month to see if I could get anything earlier but Feb 22 was the earliest date that kept coming up.

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Dang it. Now I can't use that/no lounge as a reason to give VA the flick. Keep it up VA!

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And from 28 March onwards, the schedules show VA is operating the ATRs on that route. Whoops! Time for an update!

Seems unconscionable that VA are selling seats on flights that clearly won't be operating.

Yes, they'll put a few 737s on, but they won't be operating the 9 flights per day that they're selling.

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And from 28 March onwards, the schedules show VA is operating the ATRs on that route. Whoops! Time for an update!

Seems unconscionable that VA are selling seats on flights that clearly won't be operating.

Yes, they'll put a few 737s on, but they won't be operating the 9 flights per day that they're selling.

Depends if the Alliance JV has commenced by then as you might be on a F50

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And from 28 March onwards, the schedules show VA is operating the ATRs on that route. Whoops! Time for an update!

Likely it will be operated by Alliance and currently unknown if it will be a E-Jet or Fokker. So they have most likely kept the ATR which is loaded into the booking engine.
Airlines don't guarantee aircraft type or even that the flight will operate. This was the case even pre-covid.

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Looks like VA are back on the quick CBR-SYD route from 22 Feb.
Just looking for flights to MEL and options via SYD are coming up.
And a VA email mentions CBR lounge being reopened soon, so I guess that'll be from 22 Feb as well.

I just had a quick look for some work flights I have coming up. While their schedule starts on 22 Feb, they don't fly on Sundays, and then there is a gap between 29 March and 18 April where they have no flights, before starting again on Mon 18 April. A bit odd? Maybe that's the start of the Alliance aircraft?

Also, I haven't seen any emails about the Canberra Lounge, so "soon" might be any length of time - I suspect until the business travel gets up to any sort of decent level, or the settle on a new lease arrangement with Canberra Airport.

And from 28 March onwards, the schedules show VA is operating the ATRs on that route. Whoops! Time for an update!
Seems unconscionable that VA are selling seats on flights that clearly won't be operating.
Yes, they'll put a few 737s on, but they won't be operating the 9 flights per day that they're selling.

Yes - I certainly don't see Virgin covering nine flights a day between Canberra and Sydney. I don't think they even did that in the past. Most of the time we used Virgin on the CBR-SYD leg was connecting to a flight going somewhere else.

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click to expand...

29 March and 18 April

Well, that just about covers Easter/School Hols.

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This hasn't been added to the schedule though:

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While their schedule starts on 22 Feb, they don't fly on Sundays, and then there is a gap between 29 March and 18 April where they have no flights, before starting again on Mon 18 April. A bit odd?

Definitely a bit odd. Might have some valid reasons. Unfortunately, for me, most of my SYD-CBR-SYD needs to be in that window ... I was going to fly VA to retain the Discover Gold thingy ... seems like it might not ...

Just to retain Discover Gold, I might just do SYD-MEL-SYD once in J

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Just to retain Discover Gold, I might just do SYD-MEL-SYD once in J

$199 one way?

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