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AirAsia to shift Melbourne base

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MELBOURNE, 5 February 2018: AirAsia will move its Melbourne operations to Avalon Airport from Melbourne Airport, effective later this year.

AirAsia X Malaysia will operate twice daily flights as the first international airline at the airport, while making long-haul flying accessible to more than 130 destinations in Asia for Melbourne and Victoria.

The airline and airport signed a 10-year agreement, the first such deal in Australia.

Credited with being the second busiest of the four airports serving Melbourne (passenger traffic) Avalon, is located 50 kilometres southwest of the state capital Melbourne and 15 km northeast of the city of Geelong.

The airport transfer takes 40 minutes by taxi  from Melbourne’s central business district and 20 minutes from Geelong.

A total of 500,000 international passengers are projected to move through Avalon Airport in the first year of operations.The airport is operated by Avalon Airport Australia, a wholly owned subsidiary of Fox Group Holdings.

The move was announced at an industry event at Avalon Airport 4 February.

AirAsia Group CEO and AirAsia X Co-Group CEO Tony Fernandes said, “This is an exciting milestone for AirAsia X. Since our inaugural flight in 2007, AirAsia X has flown over 30 million guests, including 6.1 million Australians … We are proud to renew our commitment to making air travel affordable for Australians with this move to Avalon, which will help us maintain our cost edge and allow us to continue offering low fares to ASEAN, Asia and beyond.”

Linfox Airports executive chairman  David Fox said: “ We anticipate around half a million international passengers will use Avalon Airport in the first year of operations. I am particularly excited about the large volumes of freight capacity that AirAsia X has on each flight.”

AirAsia flights will continue to operate from Melbourne (Tullamarine Airport) until flights from Avalon Airport are operational later this year.

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