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Summary
- Qatar Airways is growing its Doha-Boston flights to 10 weekly, the highest frequency ever.
- The increase will take effect in mid-May.
- Codeshare partner JetBlue is critical in helping to fill Qatar Airways’ Boston services.
Qatar Airways has increased flights between Doha to Boston from daily to 10 weekly. Ever since the route started in March 2016, it has never exceeded daily – until now. It will follow the arrival of Etihad at the Massachusetts airport at the end of March.
A record high for Boston
Beginning in mid-May, ahead of the peak summer season for demand, Qatar Airways will fly to Boston an additional three times weekly. All 10 weekly flights will use the two-class, 283-seat Airbus A350-900. There are 36 seats in business and 247 in economy.
Adding an extra 1,698 weekly roundtrip seats is a huge increase. Fortunately, it appears that it will only be seasonal. Still, let us hope the additional seats are filled and at sufficiently high prices. If that happens, 10-weekly might return next summer.
Photo: Thor Jorgen Udvang | Shutterstock
The new schedule is shown below, with all times local. I especially like that all the flight numbers are IATA codes for that most famous four-engined type.
- Doha to Boston: QR747, 01:35-08:10 (13h 35m) ← new three weekly
- Doha to Boston: QR743, 08:15-14:50 (13h 35m) ← daily
- Boston to Doha: QR748, 11:40-06:25+1 (11h 45m) ← new three weekly
- Doha to Boston: QR744, 21:35-16:45+1 (12h 10m) ← daily
A look at the carrier to Boston
Examining US Department of Transportation T-100 data for the 12 months to October 2023, the most recent month available to me, indicates that Qatar Airways carried 189,100 Boston passengers. It had the fewest passengers of its 12 US routes, with Dallas Fort Worth being next (213,825).
Photo: Vytautas Kielaitis | Shutterstock
On average, Boston had 259 passengers per flight. With 283-seat aircraft, it filled about 91.5% of available capacity, two percentage points higher than Qatar Airways’ US average. Of course, seat load factor is just one performance element and should not be considered in isolation.
Where Boston passengers go
Relating the 189,100 passengers to booking data shows that only approximately 5% of passengers were point-to-point: they only traveled between Doha and Boston. That is hardly surprising, although the number is still sobering.
Around 67% of passengers originated/ended in Boston and connected to another flight in Doha. After all, this is the backbone of the Middle East giants, without which many routes would not exist. Entirely predictably, most passengers traveled to/from India, with China, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and Nepal also in the top five.
Photo: Vytautas Kielaitis | Shutterstock
At the origin and destination (O&D) level, Boston-Bengaluru was the largest market. Kathmandu, Mumbai, Hyderabad, Beijing, Delhi, Chennai, Nairobi, Bangkok, and Singapore followed it. As is usually the case, each O&D was relatively small, but the collective impact was significant.
Image: GCMap
Qatar Airways and JetBlue
More interesting is the importance of the relationship with JetBlue. About one in four of Qatar Airways’ Boston passengers ‘bridged’: they connected to another flight in Boston and in Doha. The most popular O&D was Detroit-Dhaka, then Baltimore-Lagos. (JetBlue ends Boston-Baltimore in May, spelling the end of its time at the Maryland airport.) A further 3% of passengers, who originated or ended in Doha, transferred to another flight in Boston. In both instances, JetBlue was vital.
What do you make of it all? Let us know by leaving a comment.
