TAP Air Portugal has begun new service from its hub in Lisbon to San Francisco with the brand new Airbus A330-900neo jet. The new service to San Francisco (SFO) marks the flag carrier’s second regular trans-Atlantic A330neo flight to the U.S. after Chicago O’Hare and is the first non-stop service to exist between Portugal and the U.S. West Coast. This will provide travelers living in the West Coast with one more new additional nonstop travel option for transatlantic travel to Europe via the Lisbon hub. TAP will fly five weekly nonstop flights between Lisbon Airport and SFO operating on Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays, Saturdays, and Sundays departing Lisbon at 10:00 a.m. and arriving into SFO at 2:40 p.m. The flight returning back to Lisbon departs SFO at 4:10 p.m. and arrives back at 11:35 a.m. the following morning. The fight time is around 11 hours in total and travels almost 5,663 miles.“For us, all Portuguese, this is a very important moment, and for Portuguese living in California even a more important moment having a direct flight from Lisbon to Portugal,” said Maria João Lopes Cardoso, Consul General of Portugal in San Francisco. “This is (not only) a great boost for tourism but also for business.”(airlinegeeks.com)
Several weeks ago we learned that TAP Air Portugal’s first US route to get the A330-900neo would be Lisbon to Miami. Specifically, TAP Air Portugal will fly the A330-900neo 5x weekly between Lisbon and Miami as of March 1, 2019.
That flight operates with the following schedule:
TP223 Lisbon to Miami departing 10:35AM arriving 2:55PM
TP224 Miami to Lisbon departing 4:45PM arriving 5:45AM (+1 day)
TAP has now also revealed the dates as of which they’ll operate the A330-900neo on other North American routes. Specifically, TAP Air Portugal will fly the A330-900neo:
- 3x weekly between Lisbon and Toronto as of March 31, 2019
- 2x weekly between Lisbon and New York JFK as of April 13, 2019
- 3x weekly between Lisbon and Newark as of April 30, 2019
- 6x weekly between Lisbon and Boston as of July 7, 2019
- On top of their North American service with the A330-900neo, the airline has also announced service with this plane on the following routes to Brazil:
- Lisbon to Sao Paulo since December 15, 2018
- Lisbon to Salvador da Bahia as of February 2, 2019
- Lisbon to Brasilia as of February 16, 2019
- Lisbon to Belo Horizonte as of February 17, 2019
- Lisbon to Rio de Janeiro as of March 3, 2019 (onemileatatime.com)
“With more than 70 new planes on the way, this is only just the beginning,” said David Neeleman, founder of JetBlue Airways and a major shareholder in TAP. “We have 10 gateways from Brazil to Portugal and believe we can support the same number from the US. Today’s expansion to Chicago and Washington, DC reflects what an increasingly popular destination Portugal has become, especially with visitors from the U.S. Our network beyond Lisbon is also growing. We now serve 55 destinations in Europe and 17 in Africa and fully 50 percent of our American passengers are flying us to places beyond Portugal, many making use of our popular Portugal Stopover program.”
The A330neo will feature the new Airspace by Airbus cabin. The economy cabin now comprises two categories: Economy and EconomyXtra. The configuration and design provide a fresh atmosphere, with more legroom, deeper seat recline, and new seat covers in shades of green and gray, and green and red in EconomyXtra. The seat pitch in regular economy is 31 inches, while Xtra offers an additional three inches’ legroom with a pitch of 34 inches.
“These two new connections will enable an even greater number of Americans to discover what Portugal has to offer as a privileged destination to visit, to live in, to invest and to study,” said His Excellency Domingos Fezas Vital, the Ambassador of Portugal to the United States of America. “In that sense, they are a major contribution to the further strengthening of the already close links between two peoples and two countries, that are neighbors across the ocean.”(globalnewswire.com)
“When I went to Portugal for the first time to do the privatization, I had never been to Portugal. I was born in Brazil, I Speak Portuguese, but I had never been to Portugal. And now it seems that everyone that I knew either wanted to go to Portugal or heard about Portugal but no one had been there.” David Neeleman, TAP co-owner and founder of JetBlue told travelers on the inaugural flight to Lisbon.(airlinegeeks.com)
Link: airlinegeeks.com
Link: onemileatatime.com
Link: globalnewwire.com
Link: flytap.com
Aviation Travel Writer: The Flight Times Blog
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