Emirates Schedules Service Between Dubai & Mexico City (Via Barcelona)

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Emirates has been talking about launching a route between Dubai and Mexico City for quite some time and now, at least three years after it was first mentioned, the route has finally been announced.

When talks of this route first emerged (it may have been as far back as 2015) it was suggested that Emirates could serve Mexico City by opening up another 5th freedom route between Europe and North America.

Originally the European cities that were suggested as possibilities included the likes of Madrid and Zurich, but more recent discussions saw Barcelona rise as the main contender to get the route off the ground…and that’s how things have transpired.

Emirates has now announced that it will be launching service between Dubai and Mexico City via Barcelona in the coming winter season, and the airline has confirmed that it will be a 2-class 777-200LR which will operate the route.

a map of the world

The new service will operate daily from 9 December 2019 and according to the airline this will be the schedule:

EK255 DXB 03:30 – 08:00 BCN 09:55 – 16:15 MEX (Daily)
EK256 MEX 19:40 – 13:25+1 day BCN 15:10+1 day – 00:45+2 days DXB (Daily)

Here’s what Sir Tim Clark (President of Emirates) has had to say about the new route:

We are excited to be able to introduce new air connectivity between Dubai and Mexico. The availability of high-quality, daily international air services is essential for the development of tourism, business and cultural ties. Trade, especially in high-value and time-sensitive products, will be facilitated by the ample cargo capacity on Emirates’ Boeing 777 aircraft. We also expect tourism to receive a major boost from the daily flights on our newly-refurbished Boeing 777-200LR.

Due to the high altitude of Mexico City airport, it is not possible to operate a non-stop flight from Dubai, and Barcelona was a natural choice for a stopover. We are pleased to offer a direct connection on the route between the Spanish city and Mexico City that has long been neglected by other airlines and remains underserved despite the strong customer demand. We would like to thank the authorities and our partners in both Spain and Mexico for their support of the new route and look forward to provide our unique product and award-winning service to travellers.

A key takeaway here is that the route between Barcelona and Mexico City will be a true 5th freedom route in that passengers can book Emirates flights between Spain and Mexico without having to travel to Dubai.

an airplane taking off from a runway
Emirates 777-200LR – Image briYZZ via Flickr

It’s also worth noting that the new route to Mexico City is seeing Emirates add an additional daily flight to its existing 2 daily flights between Dubai and Barcelona, so capacity on this route is about to increase significantly.

Here’s what the Emirates winter schedule between Dubai and Barcelona will look like once the new route to Mexico City launches:

EK255 DXB 03:30 – 08:00 BCN (Daily 777-200L)
EK185 DXB 08:15 – 12:50 BCN (Daily A380)
EK187 DXB 15:35 – 20:10 BCN (Daily A380)

EK186 BCN 15:00 – 00:40+1 day DXB (Daily A380)
EK256 BCN 15:10 – 00:45+1 day DXB (Daily 777-200L)
EK188 BCN 22:05 – 07:35+1 day DXB (Daily A380)

It’s interesting to see that Emirates will have two flights departing Barcelona for Dubai within the space of 10 minutes every day – that’s a lot of seats to fill and may suggest that we’ll see good award availability on this route.

The Emirates 777-200LR offers a Business Class cabin with a 2-2-2 layout so, unless you’re particularly keen to look out of the windows, the two center seats will probably be the ones to go for if you’re looking for a disturbance-free flight.

a row of seats in a plane
Emirates 777-200LR Business Class

There’s good news and bad news in the 264-seat Economy Class cabin where the seats are just 17″ wide (which is just about as tight as any long-haul Economy Class seat), but where the seat pitch is between 32″ and 33″…and that’s pretty generous by modern-day standards.

Bottom Line

This is Emirates’ first passenger service to/from Mexico so it will be interesting to see how well this route works out….and I’ll be particularly interested to see how reliant the route becomes on passengers starting/ending their journeys in Barcelona.

Personally I’m most interested in the significant amount of capacity Emirates now has on its Dubai – Barcelona route as I had no idea there was so much demand for travel between those two cities – does anyone know why this may be so?