LOT launches direct flights to San Francisco
Polish Airlines LOT will open a new connection from Warsaw to San Francisco in May next year. The route will be operated four times a week using Boeing 787 Dreamliner aircraft. It is the carrier’s first new long-haul destination in years and a significant expansion of its North American network.
The flights will begin on 6 May with services scheduled on Wednesdays, Thursdays, Saturdays and Sundays. Travel time is expected to be around 11.5 hours. Tickets are already available in reservation systems, and the timetable includes both midday and evening departures from Warsaw. Return flights leave San Francisco in the afternoon or late in the evening local time.
LOT says transatlantic services are crucial to its operations. Over the past year, the airline carried 800,000 passengers between Poland and the United States. San Francisco, located next to Silicon Valley, is an important business and tourist destination, attracting both technology companies and visitors from around the world. The new route is expected to benefit business travellers heading to California as well as tourists.
San Francisco will be the sixth U.S. airport served by LOT. The carrier already flies from Warsaw to New York JFK, Newark, Miami, Chicago and Los Angeles, and maintains year-round flights from Kraków to Chicago. Seasonal flights from Kraków and Rzeszów to Newark are also available. Plans to launch flights to San Francisco first appeared in 2020 but were halted by the pandemic.
The airline still faces a shortage of long-haul aircraft and is currently using an older Boeing 777 leased from the Spanish carrier Privilege Style. Two Boeing 787-8 aircraft from Thai Airways are expected to join LOT’s fleet at the end of next year. Industry observers suggest that opening the new route may indicate that LOT is close to acquiring additional Dreamliners.
San Francisco is one of several new destinations for next year. In October LOT also announced new flights from Warsaw to Almaty, Bologna and Porto, and from Kraków to Barcelona, Madrid and Rome.
