Turkish Airlines sends A350 to Manila

Aviation Updates Philippines – Turkey's national flag carrier Turkish Airlines is deploying the Airbus A350-900 aircraft to Manila, marking the aircraft type's first international revenue flight out of Istanbul.

Beginning November 11, 2020, Turkish Airlines will assign the A350 on flights between Istanbul and Manila daily, at least until early January of 2021. The new A350 service is in replacement of the Boeing 777-300ER currently operating the route to the Philippines.

As of writing, the first Turkish A350 international service is presently en-route to the Philippines. TC-LGA is operating the maiden service with an estimated time of arrival of 6:54 pm local time.

The flag carrier has only received its first A350 aircraft three weeks earlier. Since then, it has only been operating domestic air services around Turkey as part of crew familiarization flights.

The new aircraft features the new Epianka Economy Class features and the new Aurora business class seats, in a 1-2-1 seat configuration, allowing all aisle access to the passengers. Moreover, it boasts customized illumination in the corridors, wide seats, high ceiling, and optimal cabin pressure.

Flight TK-84 departs from Istanbul at 2:15 am local time and arrives in Manila at 6:30 pm local time. The return flight, TK-85, departs almost four hours after at 10:00 pm local time. The flight arrives back in Turkey at 6:15 am local time, the next day.

Photo from Frenchpainter, Twitter