Budget airline JetStar just announced that it’s increasing the number of flights for this Australian summer. Jetstar Airways, the low-fare carrier part of Australia’s Qantas, will add two more weekly flights Syndney – Phuket starting from the middle of December. These new flights are only scheduled to last for the summer (December 15 to January 29), while airline traffic surges.

The new flights translate into 1,200 new seats every week serviced by Jetstar’s seventh A330-200, equipped with 265 seats in economy and 38 seats in premium. Apart from flights to Thailand, passengers will also benefit from increased frequency on the following routes:

• Sydney Bali increased from 4 times a week to daily flights
• Melbourne to Bali increased from 2 times a week to 3 times a week
• Sydney to Honolulu increased from 4 times a week to 5 times a week

JetStar CEO, Bruce Buchanan, said the changes offers the perfect opportunity to family that wish to travel on a budget during their summer holidays.

“We believe these new services will be met with strong demand from leisure travellers who want to get away over the Christmas and New Year holiday period on a low fares break. There”s a massive opportunity … to get a lot more capacity in those regions, and we know there”s a latent demand, because whenever we”ve gone into those markets and deployed Jetstar capacity, we”ve seen a strong uptake”

Thailand was the second most popular destination for Australians last summer, following Indonesia, with more than 378,000 visitors over the 12-month period.

Earlier, JetStar Asia, the airline’s Asian offshoot based in Singapore, announced that it will operate two daily flights, Singapore to Phuket, starting December 15th, offering over 6,200 seats to and from Phuket each week. Jetstar, a company owned by Qantas Airways Ltd, benefited from the rise of airtraffic in Asia, with one of the most recognized brand in the area. (via ANI)