Cairns route a new era
SilkAir continues on flight path to growth
OUR history with Cairns goes back to October 28, 1995, when our parent company Singapore Airlines started flights here.
But due to unfavourable market conditions, operations were ceased on March 25, 2001.
We are very happy to be back in Cairns and the launch of this new flight service is a special and important moment for SilkAir.
It marks the second Australian city in our route network following the introduction of our flights to Darwin back in 2012.
Together with our parent company, Singapore Airlines and SilkAir now offer 121 weekly services to seven points in Australia, including Adelaide, Brisbane, Darwin, Melbourne, Perth, Sydney and now, the adventure-capital of the country – Cairns.
We look forward to this service continuing the momentum towards closer ties with Australia and the chance to develop more tourism opportunities as well as business and cultural exchanges.
Home to two of the world’s greatest natural wonders: the UNESCO listed Great Barrier Reef and 170 million years old Daintree rainforest, travellers can easily access the dazzling natural environment of Cairns.
We are pleased to be catering to the growing demand of leisure travellers by making this holiday destination accessible to the adventure-seekers among us.
In addition this service allows our friends in Cairns the opportunity to not only visit and explore Singapore but also easily connect onwards to over 90 destinations in 35 countries within the SilkAir and Singapore Airlines combined network.
Our commitment to Cairns does not end with this thriceweekly service. We are committed to promoting tourism to Cairns and its surrounding areas.
This opportunity to start operations to Cairns comes at an exciting time for SilkAir, as we continue on our path of expansion. Last year was a special one for SilkAir as we took delivery of the first of our Boeing 737-800 aircraft. Today, we have a fleet of 10 Boeing aircraft on top of our Airbus A320 and A319 fleet.
The growth of our fleet has allowed us to introduce 17 new destinations to our network in the past five years and has also enabled us to start operations between Cairns and Singapore.
As we start to fly to other destinations, we have also introduced a wireless in-flight entertainment system, SilkAir Studio, in May last year.
All passengers can wirelessly access movies, short features and audio content and stream them directly on their personal device.
Cabin crew are sporting an updated new look. Our junior crew now don the aqua-blue uniform, while our senior crew wear the plum-red uniform, introduced just last month, in April. Customers can look forward to a full-service experience in our latest Boeing 737-800 aircraft.
Customers will have access to the full-service offerings of 30kg and 40kg free baggage allowance for economy and business class passengers respectively, delicious in-flight meals, ability to earn KrisFlyer miles, reliable flight schedules, seamless check-in between SilkAir and Singapore Airlines flights.
We look forward to a new chapter in our operations into Australia.
I offer my sincere gratitude to Cairns Airport, Tourism and Events Queensland and Tourism Tropical North Queensland, the immigration authorities and our service and business partners.
We would like to thank you for your invaluable support and look forward to developing a strong working relationship with you.
We sincerely hope that our new service will open a new chapter in our relationship and contribute to growth and greater success for Cairns.