The addition of Palau, which is part of Micronesia and lies north of Papua New Guinea and east of the Philippines, gives Brisbane the highest number of Pacific connections out of any Australian airport, with a total of 14.
It comes a year after Qantas’ pilot union accused the airline of a failure of fleet planning by not having enough new international aircraft, and with Boeing and Airbus experiencing delivery delays.
The flights, operating three times per week, use WA-based 150-seater A319 aircraft, with the first service touching down in Newcastle from Perth at around 1:15pm on Monday aboard VH-8NS before returning just under 90 minutes later.
The addition of Palau, which is part of Micronesia and lies north of Papua New Guinea and east of the Philippines, gives Brisbane the highest number of Pacific connections out of any Australian airport, with a total of 14.