Record bookings at Etihad Airways

Etihad Airways achieved a new milestone on Monday 11th June when more than 65,500 flight bookings were made with the Abu Dhabi-based airline. The figure was the highest number of bookings ever made in a single day with Etihad Airways and exceeded the previous record, on Monday January 9th, by 13 per cent. In addition, passenger bookings for Thursday June 14th to Sunday June 17th are the highest of any four days previously experienced by Etihad Airways. Advance premium cabin bookings for a single day are set to beat previous Etihad Airways records, with nearly 2,900 combined bookings already received for Diamond First and Pearl Business Class flights on Sunday June 17th. The most popular overall destinations for travel over the June 14th-17th periodare Bangkok, Manila, flights to London, flights to Riyadh and Jeddah. Top premium travel destinations also include flights to Paris, Sydney and Frankfurt. James Hogan, Etihad Airways’ president and chief executive, said: “Etihad Airways is experiencing exceptional demand for flights across our network for this weekend and into the summer. “We are delighted to have broken our own records for flights bookings and will look to raise the bar further over the coming months. “The Etihad Airways network and aircraft fleet has expanded greatly in the past 12 months and we are delighted to offer customers flights and world class services to short, medium and long haul destinations. “This flight demand will continue to grow and we urge our customers to book their summer travel quickly to avoid disappointment.” New records have also been set by the Etihad Airways new global media advertising campaign that was launched at the beginning of June. The “Why Etihad?” television commercial has now received more than 1.5 million views on YouTube for the English version and almost 100,000 views for the Arabic version. Etihad Airways will operate 1,262 flights each week in the summer of 2012, compared to 1,106 flights in the summer of 2011, an increase of 14 per cent. The airline has 280,498 seats on its flights available each week compared to 235,818 seats per week last summer, an increase of 19 per cent. There is a 14 per cent increase in the number of global destinations on the Etihad Airways flight network in the summer of 2012, with flights operating to 73 passenger destinations compared to 64 in 2011. Etihad is considered the World’s Leading Airline by the World Travel Awards.