British Airways to expand operations during July

British Airways will expand its long-haul operations this month, starting with the restoration of a number of US and Caribbean routes.

BA restarted flights to San Francisco last month, and has been serving Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, New York JFK and Washington throughout the crisis.

In the Far East, BA also restarted flights to Hong Kong and Singapore last month, and will make a limited return to Tokyo Haneda later this month too.

Now, the carrier has revealed it is ready to return to a "small number" of its "normal" long-haul routes by the end of July.

These include flights to Bermuda, Dallas, Miami, Seattle and Toronto. Returning Caribbean destinations, meanwhile, include Barbados and Kingston.

BA will also expand its short-haul UK and European flight programme this month, with dozens of countries set to return to BA’s schedule.

Returning European short-haul destinations include Austria, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Croatia, Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Kosovo, Morocco, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and Turkey.

In the UK, domestic flights will resume between London and Belfast, Inverness, Jersey, Manchester, Newcastle and Newquay. BA will also double its daily Edinburgh and Glasgow services.

Safety

BA chairman and chief executive Alex Cruz said: “Following months of lockdown and stress, we know people will want to travel to be reunited with friends and family and to take a well-deserved break.

“We have put in place measures – to UK government and aviation regulator standards – to ensure we’re doing all we can to protect the wellbeing of our customers and colleagues, and we’ll be asking them to play their part in that too.”

New safety measures and guidance include:

• Checking-in online, downloading boarding passes and, where possible, self-scanning boarding passes at the departure gate
• Observing social distancing and using hand sanitiser station placed throughout airports
• Wearing a face mask at all times and bringing enough to replace them every four hours on longer flights for
• Urging passengers not to travel if they think they have any symptoms of Covid-19
• PPE for cabin crew, and a new food service reducing interactions
• Asking customers to ensure they have everything they need from their hand luggage before departure, and where possible, storing their carry-on bag under the seat in front of them
• All surfaces, including seats, screens, seat buckles and tray tables will be cleaned after every flight, with every aircraft cleaned nose to tail every day