Emirates Starts Chicago Flights

Emirates launches daily services between Dubai and Chicago today, its ninth US destination.

The route is operated by a three-class Boeing 777-200LR aircraft. EK235 departs Dubai International Airport at 0945 and arrives at Chicago O’Hare at 1525, and EK236 leaves Chicago at 2035 and lands in Dubai 1910 the following day.

Emirates president Tim Clark said: “Like Dubai, Chicago is a major global trade and transportation hub with great cultural diversity that is an economic engine for its region.”

Emirates’ global network provides Chicago passengers and shippers with new international trade and tourism opportunities, via Dubai, and vice versa. As well as as a key destination in its own right, Chicago is a major east-west connection point in the US and provides Emirates, whose network is strong in major coastal metropolitan areas, with greater US market access.

It becomes the fourth market in the US where Emirates, Etihad and Qatar Airways will compete on services from the Gulf.

Buoyed by an improving US economy, and opportunities for transfer traffic with their growing widebody fleets, all three Gulf carriers continue to expand rapidly in Noth America.