Turkmenistan Airlines launches first direct flights to Vietnam
VOV.VN - A Boeing 777-300ER of Turkmenistan Airlines departing from Turkmenistan’s capital of Ashgabat landed at Tan Son Nhat airport in Vietnam’s Ho Chi Minh City at 1:30 a.m. on March 6, kick-starting a direct air route between the two countries.
The airline is scheduled to operate two flights per week on Wednesdays and Thursdays, from March 5 to October 27. A round-trip ticket is priced at about US$500, equal to VND12 million, for economy class.
Toyli Sakhadov, senior leader of Turkmenistan Airlines, said the airline has viewed Vietnam as a potential market since 2014. To prepare for the service, he added, the firm signed a contract in 2022 to purchase two Boeing 777-300ERs to run flights between the two destinations.
The new air service has helped to shorten the travel time by nearly half, as it takes only nine hours to fly from Ashgabat to Ho Chi Minh City compared to 18 hours previously.
Before launching commercial routes, Turkmenistan Airlines operated a cargo route for the first time to Vietnam using the Airbus-330-200P2F in 2022. By 2023, the carrier was operating one more cargo flight to Hanoi every week.
