Emirates Trims A380 Schedule To Germany For February

Emirates has slimmed its planned Airbus A380 service to Germany over the coming month. According to flight schedule data from Cirium, Frankfurt and Munich will see the most significant cuts, while services to Dusseldorf and Hamburg will see a smaller drop when it comes to the giant of the skies.

Emirates has trimmed its A380 service to Germany for February. Photo: Emirates

In April 2020, the entire Emirates Airbus A380 fleet was grounded. The airline’s initial focus was on bringing back its lower-capacity Boeing 777 fleet. Once this reached full utilization, the dual-type airline had no alternative to bringing the giant of the skies back. Now, around half of the fleet has returned to the skies.

Cutting capacity to Germany

It seems as though Emirates’ capacity to Germany will be slightly smaller than it had expected. The airline has trimmed its schedule and capacity to the country over the past week, according to schedule data from aviation data experts Cirium.

As of last week, Emirates had 216 flights scheduled to Germany. This equated to double daily A380 flights to Dusseldorf, Frankfurt, and Munich, while Hamburg had a daily A380 service planned, alongside a daily Boeing 777 service. Combined, both of the aircraft meant that Emirates would offer 103,132 seats from Dubai to Germany across the shortest month.

Some of the services will be replaced by the Boeing 777. Photo: Vincenzo Pace | Simple Flying

The picture this week is quite a bit different. In total, the Dubai-based carrier now only had 196 flights planned to Germany. Of course, 216-48 is not equal to 196. While some A380 flights have been re-scheduled with the Boeing 777, others appear to have been canceled entirely. The following is now planned for February (giving a reduced capacity of 89,823 seats),

• Dusseldorf (DUS) – 47x Airbus A380
• Frankfurt (FRA) – 38x Airbus A380 – 14x Boeing 777
• Hamburg (HAM) – 22x Airbus A380 – 26x Boeing 777
• Munich (MUC) – 33x Airbus A380 – 16x Boeing 777

The only other destination to see a change in its Airbus A380 schedule for February in the past week was London Heathrow, which loses one service with the giant of the skies across the entire month.

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Only four German destinations

Emirates only serves four destinations in Germany, and one potentially obvious one appears to be missing. The airline doesn’t fly to Berlin, the capital city of Germany. This is due to rules that limit the UAE carrier to four destinations in the country. The matter regularly comes up, and Emirates has suggested that the destination would be of interest to them if it weren’t for the carrier’s four other destinations.

The giant of the skies will continue serving all of its German destinations with the A380. Photo: Tom Boon – Simple Flying

However, with double daily Airbus A380 flights on all of its other German routes some days, the airline is clearly not lacking demand on these services. In March 2021, Tim Clark mentioned that the city’s absence was noticeable. Back at the 2019 Dubai Airshow, the airline’s CEO Sheikh Ahmed suggested that the airline had already invested a lot in its current German network, adding that Germany and Berlin should offer the airline incentives if it wants the capital city served.

What do you make of Emirates’ A380 cuts for February? Let us know what you think and why in the comments. 

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