Emirates today arrives in Chicago

Emirates (Dubai) today (August 6) will arrive in Chicago. The fast-growing airline commenced a daily nonstop passenger service to Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport from Dubai.

The new service will operate as flight EK 235, departing from Dubai International airport at 9:45 a.m. (0945) and arriving at O’Hare at 3:25 p.m. (1525) The return flight, EK 236, will depart O’Hare at 8:35 p.m. (2035) and arrive in Dubai at 7:10 p.m. (1910) the next day. The route will be served by the U.S.-built Boeing 777-200 LR aircraft powered by GE90 engines.

In addition to passenger service, the Chicago-Dubai flight will carry up to 17 tons of cargo per flight and increase trade links between the two cities. Emirates began operating cargo service to Chicago in 2013. Currently, Emirates SkyCargo flies a twice-weekly, dedicated freight service out of O’Hare that carried nearly 12,000 tons of cargo last year.

Emirates began passenger services to the U.S. in 2004 with services to New York. The airline has steadily added more U.S. routes over the past decade. Chicago is the ninth U.S. gateway to join the Emirates network, following the launch of the Boston service in March. In the past decade, Emirates has flown more than 9 million people to and from the U.S. and is the airline which carries the most amount of passengers between the U.S. and Middle East. To cater to that demand, Emirates is upsizing services on its Dallas/Fort Worth, San Francisco and Houston (Bush Intercontinental) routes to its iconic double-decker A380 aircraft in late 2014.

Emirates is the largest operator of Boeing 777 aircraft in the world, with a fleet of 128 passenger aircraft and 11 freighters. The airline is a launch customer of Boeing’s new 777X. In November 2013, Emirates placed the largest single order in commercial aviation history for 150 777X aircraft valued at $76 billion. Based on the U.S. Department of Commerce’s aerospace export multiplier, this order will support more than 400,000 jobs in the United States.