Emirates is increasing its services in Sydney and Melbourne, returning the airline’s capacity to pre-pandemic levels in another sign the aviation industry is getting back to normal in Australia.

From March 26, Emirates will increase its daily flights from Melbourne to Dubai, via Singapore, from two to three.

Additionally from May 1, there will be a daily direct service to Dubai from Sydney.

The extra flights will see Emirates operate at pre-pandemic levels out of Sydney and Melbourne.

“Adding a third daily service to Sydney and Melbourne will offer over 500,000 additional seats to and from Australia in a year,” said Australasia divisional vice-president Barry Brown.

“To have the two cities operating back at pre-pandemic frequencies is a phenomenal milestone in our restoration of Australia capacity and testament to our long-standing commitment to flying Down Under.”

By mid-2023, Emirates will have the capacity to fly more than 55,000 passengers to and from Australia’s major cities, with 63 weekly services.

Sydney Airport CEO Geoff Culbert said the extra flights are an “important step towards Australia’s international aviation recovery”.

The announcement, which was made on Monday, follows the airline announcing double daily flights to Brisbane, starting on June 1.

Emirates will also restart its Christchurch, New Zealand service via Sydney.

The airline is not alone in adding more flights from Australia.

Last year, Jetstar announced direct services from Auckland to Brisbane, starting in March. Virgin also announced from June this year it would be flying 2000 people every week from Cairns to Tokyo.

Overseas arrivals and departures rise

Travel numbers are slowly getting back to pre-pandemic levels. Photo: AAP

The Australian Bureau of Statistics recently released data that indicates travel numbers are returning to where they used to be.

In January 2020, before the COVID-19 pandemic took hold, Australia welcomed 2.26 million travellers, while 2.24 million people left the country.

Because of COVID and subsequent restrictions and border closures, there were very few arrivals and departures.

However, in November, Australia recorded 1.27 million arrivals and 1.52 million departures – the highest figures seen in years.

International arrivals and departures are creeping up to where they were before COVID.

And the Sydney to Melbourne travel route was also back among the world’s busiest for 2022, according to flight analytics provider OAG.

It has an annual seat total of more than 8.2 million.

Cheaper airfares?

With domestic travel returning last year, the surge in demand led to a surge in prices.

“Airfares have risen due to strong demand for travel and constrained supply as airlines have scaled back their schedules in response to high jet fuel costs and operational challenges,” Australian Competition and Consumer Commission commissioner Anna Brakey said in December.

Fortunately, ACCC chair Gina Cass-Gottlieb told the Herald Sun prices are beginning to moderate.

When asked when the cost of a plane ticket would return to pre-pandemic levels, she said the ACCC was hoping by the middle of the year.

She said the pent-up demand for domestic travel last year came back much quicker than the airlines had capacity for.

“We’re particularly keen to see that they keep increasing capacity to be able to meet Australians interest to fly,” she said, adding that restraining demand and keeping prices high would be “serious anti-competitive conduct”.