VS Launches ICN

The long anticipated route to Seoul has finally been announced as launching in March 2026:

https://corporate.virginatlantic.com/gb ... seoul.html

Seoul, Let’s roll! New daily flights to Seoul, South Korea will launch on 29th March 2026 creating new East Asian connections to Japan, Greater China, Vietnam, Australia and New Zealand

Interesting! Looks like going to Japan will be accomplished with a connecting Korean Air flight. Presumably, it'll be all be do-able via the VA website as opposed to buying individual tickets for each flight. As a JP citizen, the price of direct flights out of JP have been ridiculously expensive as of late, so more options are certainly welcome and I do prefer the ICN route if I have to do a connection due to the relative shortness of the ICN-HND route time.

Of course, I would welcome a HND-LHR direct route all on VA alone just like the great old days when VA flew to Narita, but this will do for now!

[mitchja]

Revenue flights now loaded and available to book. No sign of reward flights yet so far though.

VS208 departs LHR 09:45 arriving ICN 06:05 B789
VS209 departs ICN 08:35 arriving LHR 15:05 B789

There is an advisory on the VS website that sales of this route are on pause:

https://www.virginatlantic.com/where-we ... outh-korea

Seoul’s calling - just not quite yet

We’re gearing up to launch new flights to Seoul from 29th March 2026. While we’re putting the final touches in place, sales are on pause. We’ll be up and running again soon, and can’t wait to welcome you onboard.

I have booked that first flight but I don't think they are giving this route a chance. Early morning departure in both directions is pretty much a route killer.

[mitchja]

I wonder if there's a delay to VS getting government approvals etc as a' subject to government approval' footnote was always displayed on all VS ICN flights?

I noticed the flight times where also insane for ICN which I I guess is down to not being able to fly over Russian airspace. VS were quoting 14.5 Hrs on the return flight

Not the first time VS have had to delay a new route launch due to them not getting approval/paperwork in place in time - I got stung by this with booking a VS flight to BGI when that route first launched. We were transferred onto another carrier so anyone already booked may find themselves rebooked on the codeshared KE flight.

I found a really good miles saver redemption about a week ago for next year. I didnt bother booking it at the time, but I hope it's still there when they reopen sales!!

How long ago was the BGI launch Mitchja?

[mitchja]

How long ago was the BGI launch Mitchja?

It would be around 1997 or 1998 from LGW as VS officially launched BGI in Sept 1998. We booked via Virgin Holidays which included VS flights, however, I remember receiving a letter from V Hols informing us that VS had not received the licence in time and we were transferred onto a BA flight.

Edit - found my V Hols booking ref which ends in /S97 so it must have been 1997 (the old V Hols refs always ended with the season + year code).