Air Arabia To Begin Flights From Ras Al Khaimah To Qatar

Sharjah-based carrier Air Arabia will begin flights to Qatar’s capital city Doha from its recently opened hub in Ras Al Khaimah (RAK), the airline said in a statement.

Starting from February 22, the low cost airline will fly four times per week to Doha, bringing the total number of destinations from its northern emirate hub to nine.

“When we launched our Ras Al Khaimah hub in 2014, we made a firm commitment to increase connectivity to and from the Northern Emirates,’ said Adel Ali, group CEO of Air Arabia.

“Ras Al Khaimah is one of the region’s most attractive destinations and we are confident that our newly launched flights will provide customers with great connectivity between both cities, both for leisure and for business.”

The UAE-listed carrier took over as RAK’s designated airline last year after the emirate’s official carrier RAK Airways shut down due to mounting financial pressure.

Following the launch of its operations at the northern emirate, Air Arabia began direct services to Cairo, Muscat, Islamabad, Peshawar, Lahore, Dhaka, Chittagong and Jeddah.

Aside from its operations in RAK, Air Arabia operates from four other international hubs including Sharjah, Morocco, Jordan and Egypt.

The carrier recently announced the establishment of a hub in Jordan following the purchase of a 49 per cent stake in the local carrier Petra Airlines.

The move is expected to help the airline access more locations in the Middle East, Africa and Europe, with whom Jordan shares an open skies policy.

Air Arabia, which reported a 30 per cent fall in fourth quarter profit in 2014, also began servicing new markets this year.

It recently announced plans to begin services to China, becoming the first low cost carrier to do so.