KLM began Dubai scheduled commercial passenger and cargo flights on April 5th, 1972. It had a 1x weekly DC-8 flight, routing Amsterdam-Athens-Dhahran (Dammam)-Dubai. Now it is mainly by the B777.
It has been 50 years since KLM began Dubai, beginning on April 5th, 1972, using the DC-8. By March 1974, a second-weekly service was operating, routing Amsterdam-Athens-Kuwait-Dubai, also by the four-engine aircraft.
KLM to the Middle East in 1972
In the aviation summer season of 1972, KLM served Abadan (Iran), Amman, Baghdad, Beirut, Damascus, Dhahran, Dubai, Jeddah, Tehran, and Tel Aviv in the Middle East.
They began in Amsterdam, ran 1x weekly, and were multi-stop, according to the September 1972 paperback edition of OAG, as reported by Routesonline.
It is hard to comprehend how much things have changed since the early 1970s, not just in Dubai itself, which discovered oil in 1966.
According to KLM, Dubai had barely 500,000 passengers in 1970, rising to 86.4 million in 2019. Amsterdam, meanwhile, had about five million, growing to 72 million in 2019.
KLM to Dubai since 2004
The Dutch carrier has over 336,000 seats for sale on 3,215-mile (5,174km) route in 2022, according to Cirium data. It is 83% of what it had in 2021, its best year yet (at least in terms of what was available rather than sold), but up by more than a third (36%) versus 2019.
What is especially notable is how many aircraft types have been used to Dubai in the past 18 years, with ten types/variants deployed, including the iconic MD-11. However, only the B777-200ER has been used in each year, with the 316-seater responsible for two-thirds of KLM’s 5.7 million Dubai seats since 2004.
Where do its Dubai passengers go?
Booking data shows that approximately six in every ten KLM passengers to/from Dubai transited its Schiphol hub in 2019. The bulk were from across Europe, with the UK, France, Germany, US, Colombia, Canada, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, and Spain the ten most significant countries.
More interesting are the airport-level origins and destinations. Bogotá to Dubai, over Amsterdam, had more passengers than anywhere else, followed by Paris CDG, London Heathrow, Aberdeen, Gothenburg, Berlin Tegel (as it then was), Billund, Toronto, Manchester, and Norwich.
In the current week…
For most of the past 18 years, KLM had a 1x daily Dubai service. However, it has also had 2x daily, as reflected in the higher volume of seats for sale in the figure above.
The current week is no exception, with the following 10x weekly serving operating (all times are local). There is a 1x daily non-stop terminator service and a 3x weekly triangular operation via Riyadh inbound and non-stop back to Amsterdam.
- Amsterdam to Dubai: KL427, 14:30-23:10; 1x daily (3x B777-300ER, 2x B777-200ER, 2x B787-9)
- Amsterdam to Dubai: KL419, 15:50-03:00+1; 3x weekly via Riyadh; A330-200
- Dubai to Amsterdam: KL428, 00:55-05:55; 1x daily
- Dubai to Amsterdam: KL419, 04:40-09:40; 3x weekly
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