ITA Airways set to fly to Maldives, postpones Japan route start

On December 17 ITA Airways will open a new seasonal non-stop service between Rome Fiumicino (FCO) and Male, Maldives (MLE), the company’s first destination in the Indian Ocean and aimed at leisure passenger traffic.

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Initially the route will offer two weekly flights (Saturday and Sunday) and will be operated on Airbus A350-900 aircraft with a capacity of 334 passengers in two classes (33 Business Class/301 Economy). Between December 21, 2022 to January 22, 2023 the service will increase to a three times per week operation (Wednesdays, Thursdays, and Sundays).

From January 12, 2023, the Italian flag carrier will change to the Airbus A330-200 with a capacity of 256 seats in three classes (20 Business Class/17 Premium Economy/219 Economy). As of January 28, 2023, the route returns to its initial operation of two flights per week until March 26, 2023.

For the winter season 2022/2023, ITA Airways will have a 48.2% share of the market between Italy and Maldives, the company will compete in this segment against the leisure airline Neos which offers flights from Male to Rome and Milan on Boeing 787 Dreamliner.

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Flight itinerary

• Rome Fiumicino – Male, Maldives Flight AZ 776 FCO 22:10 – MLE 11:20+1
• Male, Maldives – Rome Fiumicino Flight AZ 777 MLE 13:25 – FCO 19:30

With this new service customers will have the option to connect through ITA Airways’ network of 8 intercontinental, 22 domestic and 33 international destinations. With this new route the company expects to meet the strong demand to holiday destinations such as the Maldives.

Data obtained by Aviacionline through the Ente Nazionale Per L’Aviaziones Civile (ENAC) indicates that 112,480 passengers were mobilized in 2019 between Italy and the Maldives.

New destination to Japan for the winter

ITA Airways has rescheduled its service between Rome Fiumicino and Tokyo Haneda (HND) for October 30, 2022, with three weekly flights. It is expected that by April 2023 the service will increase to daily flights:

• Rome Fiumicino – Tokyo Haneda Flight AZ 792 FCO 15:00 – HND 11:35+1 Wednesday, Friday and Sunday.
• Tokyo Haneda – Rome Fiumicino Flight AZ 793 HND 13:35 – FCO 18:55 Monday, Thursday and Saturday.

According to data obtained by ENAC, prior to the pandemic, 327,709 passengers flew between Japan and Italy.

See also: ITA Airways increases flights to New York