Haneda rather than Narita will be served, with only three weekly flights rather than the previously expected daily.
SAS is the latest airline to return to Tokyo. Aside from some Easter flights to capitalize on the demand in that period, regular flights will resume in June, as previously announced. This summer, 13 airlines will have non-stop Europe-Tokyo passenger service, connecting the Japanese capital to 13 airports across the continent.
The world's leading widebody airport, Tokyo Haneda, will welcome SAS from Copenhagen on a normal basis from June 1st. Pre-pandemic, it served Narita. With three weekly A350-900 flights rather than the previously planned daily operation, Haneda's schedule is as follows, with all times local. (June 1st is a Thursday. After that, flights to Japan will run on Wednesdays, Fridays, and Sundays.)
Click here for Copenhagen-Tokyo flights.
Note the very long block times. On June 1st, 2019, it was blocked at 10:50 to Tokyo and 11:20 back. The considerable increase is, of course, due to the war in Ukraine and the inability to overfly Russia. This necessitates much longer and more costly flight routings.
Analyzing SAS' booking data for 2019 shows approximately 120,000 roundtrip passengers transited Copenhagen. Given the carrier's geographic location, it shouldn't be surprising that Norway, Sweden, Iceland, the UK, and Finland were its top country markets to/from Tokyo. The carrier is, of course, heavily dominant in Norway and Sweden.
Broken down, Stockholm over Copenhagen to/from Tokyo was SAS' most popular transit market. It had an estimated one-quarter share of the market. Flying via Copenhagen requires backtracking and adds about 14% more miles versus what a non-stop would be. Booking data shows more passengers flew Finnair over Helsinki, helped by flying less than 1% further than the non-stop distance.
Click here for Stockholm-Tokyo flights.
According to the latest OAG data, SAS expects 26 departing flights to the Far East this July on two routes: Copenhagen to Haneda and Shanghai. In comparison, it had 114 departures in July 2019. Its operation is at just 22% of what it was when it flew from Denmark's capital to Beijing, Hong Kong, Shanghai, and Tokyo Narita. This shows how much recovery must still occur, assuming they will return.
This summer, 13 airlines have Europe-Tokyo flights. Ordered by the number of departing flights, they are Japan Airlines, All Nippon, Lufthansa, Air France, British Airways, Finnair, Turkish Airlines, ITA Airways, LOT Polish, SWISS, Austrian, SAS, and KLM. With nearly half of the flights, the non-stop market is heavily dominated by Star Alliance.
London Heathrow has almost a quarter of services, making it Europe's most-served airport. Then it is Frankfurt, Paris CDG, Helsinki, Istanbul, Munich, Rome, Warsaw, Zurich, Vienna, Copenhagen, Amsterdam, and Brussels. Heathrow has an average of five daily summer flights to Tokyo, served by All Nippon, British Airways, and Japan Airlines.
Will you be flying between Europe and Tokyo this summer? Let us know in the comments.
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Route Development Analyst – James lives and breathes route development. Educated in Air Transport Management at Loughborough and Cranfield, James was Market Opportunity Analyst at London Luton Airport and Chief Analyst at anna.aero. Now writing data-driven analysis for Simple Flying. Based near London, UK.