Today's Irish Times reports that the Irish PM, Bertie Ahern, who recently visited Saudi and the UAE on a trade visit, paid a visit to Etihad during his stop in Abu Dhabi. Etihad is expected to approve a DUB service during an upcoming board meeting, with services to start later in the year.
"One of the world's fastest-growing airlines may decide within weeks to begin direct flights between Dublin and Abu Dhabi, with onward connections to Australia and major centres in Asia.
Taoiseach Bertie Ahern yesterday held two hours of talks with James Hogan, chief executive of Etihad Airways, the Abu Dhabi-based national airline of the United Arab Emirates and other senior company executives.
The airline was established four years ago.
The direct flights, planned to run four times a week, would cut hours off the journey time to Australia and Asia for Irish travellers, who currently have to make two connections in Europe and Asia to reach Australian destinations.
Etihad executive Vijay Poonoosamy said the airline was "seriously considering" opening the service "in the near future - sometime this year", and that the issue would go to the company's board shortly.
The airline announced a week ago that it would begin daily flights to Australia from Abu Dhabi following a bilateral aviation agreement between the United Arab Emirates and the Australian government."
The article goes on to state that EK may also add DUB, but this may be up to two years down the road.
So, good on you, Regi; you weren't too far off the mark after all!
It will be interesting to see whether other aspects of the predictions come to fruition: EI leaving DXB (I nearly wrote "EK leaving DXB" - now that would be fun!
), or starting new far eastern services?