USA Today: Virgin Australia
 

The 10 best airlines you've never flown

Virgin Australia

Home base and hubs: Home base and primary hub, Sydney Airport; secondary hubs at Brisbane, Melbourne, and Perth.

Market area: Virgin Australia provides full cover of Australian domestic routes and flies nonstop from Los Angeles to Brisbane, Melbourne, and Sydney and from Honolulu to Sydney.

Alliances and partners: No alliance, but partners with Delta, Air New Zealand, Etihad, Hawaiian Airlines, Singapore Airlines, Virgin America, and Virgin Atlantic.

What's special: Virgin Australia recently combined formerly separate domestic and transpacific operations and now is eclipsing the fading star of Qantas in that part of the world. Its international economy product is fairly good, and it offers good premium-economy and business-class service. And, as with the rest of the worldwide Virgin group, nobody can beat Sir Richard Branson's particular brand of airline hype.

Downside: Limited U.S. gateways.

The 10 best airlines you've never flown - USATODAY.com

Isn't Honolulu-Sydney a codeshare on Hawaiian?