Virgin Atlantic scraps London Heathrow-Hong Kong route after 30 years

Virgin Atlantic will not be resuming flights between London Heathrow (LHR) to Hong Kong (HKG) due to the closure of Russian airspace.

The decision to quit the route comes after almost 30 years of connecting Hong Kong to London. While the route had been suspended since December 2021, the carrier had planned to resume it in March 2023.

The UK-based carrier said it was a “difficult decision”. It will instead use the freed-up capacity for other destinations in its network for summer 2023.

“Significant operational complexities due to the ongoing Russian airspace closure have contributed to the commercial decision not to resume flights in March 2023 as planned, which have already been paused since December 2021,” it said in a statement on October 5, 2022.

For example, avoiding Russian airspace would add some 60 minutes to the flight time from LHR to HKG and approximately 1 hour 50 minutes in the other direction. The closure of Russian airspace has hit many European carriers, Finnair in particular