Durban’s King Shaka Int’l lands its first direct flight from London

The first direct flight between London’s Heathrow and Durban’s King Shaka International Airport has touched down in the early hours of Tuesday morning.

Arriving at 5.20am, the Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner was the first direct flight between the two hubs after the route announcement was made in May.

Flight BA41 lasted a little over 11 hours.

A warm welcome to @British_Airways as they touched down @kingshakaint for the very first time. We are pleased to have you be part of the KSIA family. pic.twitter.com/SDxKis8QZT

— King Shaka Int (@kingshakaint) 30 October 2018

“A warm welcome to @British_Airways as they touched down @kingshakaint for the very first time. We are pleased to have you be part of the KSIA family,” the airport’s official Twitter account wrote.

The flight is a boon for Durban.

If they take this flight, travellers will no longer be required to connect to Heathrow via Johannesburg’s OR Tambo or Dubai International. It won’t be cheap, with flexible tickets starting in the R11 000 range, but it will make it easier to get to the coastal city.

The flight will operate three times a week, joining Cape Town International’s two direct flights to Heathrow per day, and OR Tambo International’s five direct flights per day. The latter has a sixth additional flight that operates four times per week.

British Airways’ return flight is scheduled for 1 November, while the first flight back to London — BA40 — is cruizing the skies over Africa at the time of writing.

Feature image: Matt Kieffer via Flickr (CC BY-SA 2.0, cropped)