Tuesday, November 19, 2013

More new United routes out of IAH

Per Molly Ryan at the Houston Business Journal, there's a route to Munich on the way and a second route to Tokyo....


United Airlines to launch new international flights from Houston. Molly Ryan, Houston Business Journal

The new Munich service is scheduled to start April 24, 2014 and the new Tokyo service is scheduled to start March 30, 2014.

The flight to Munich will have 242 seats and will depart Houston’s George Bush Intercontinental Airport (IAH) every day at 4:10 p.m. It will arrive at Munich’s Franz Joseph Strauss International Airport at 9:50 a.m. the next day. The return flight to Houston leaves Munich at 9:25 a.m. and arrives in Houston at 2:15 p.m. the same day.

The flight to Tokyo is United’s second direct flight from IAH. The new flight, which has 267 seats, leaves IAH at 9 a.m. every day and arrives in Tokyo the next day at 12:35 p.m. The return flight from Tokyo leaves at 6:55 p.m. and arrives in Houston at 4:55 p.m. the same day.



Based on the United Fleet chart I'm guessing the Munich flight will be flown by the 764 ER and the 2nd Tokyo flight will be flown by the 772 v5.

The downside of this is that both flights are 2-cabin, with only Business/First as an option and not United GlobalFirst. If you're paying for your flight to Munich/Tokyo this will probably not affect you much, but if you're looking for a premium cabin reward redemption there could be better options available.

Still, it's new service, direct to a new city (Munich) that improves United's route network from IAH. That shouldn't be overlooked.