This was announced by HE Eng. Khaled Al-Molhem, Director General of Saudia. “Our new flight to Toronto comes as part of our efforts to strengthen our international presence and serve various groups of passengers including Saudi students who have been pursuing their higher studies at Canadian universities on King Abdullah Foreign Scholarship Program,” he said.

“We also intend to provide excellent services to Haj and Umrah pilgrims who come to Saudi Arabia from Canada, promote business and tourism relations and cater to the needs of transit passengers who travel by King Abdulaziz International Airport in Jeddah. Moreover, we intend to operate direct flights to Toronto, saving a lot of time and energy for our valued customers,” the DG pointed out.

Al-Molhem said Saudia would operate three flights weekly between the Kingdom and Toronto on Mondays, Thursdays and Saturdays and the flight in one direction would take thirteen and a half hours. The outgoing flight SV0060 will take off from Riyadh to Toronto via Jeddah while the return flight SV0061 will follow the route: Toronto-Jeddah-Riyadh.

Saudia would use Boeing 777-200 aircraft for its Toronto flights. This aircraft has 24 seats for the First Class, 38 seats for Business Class and 170 seats for Guest Class, the DG said, adding that all classes of the aircraft are designed to provide passengers with maximum comfort with advanced audio and visual systems offering a variety of attractive entertainment programs.

Saudia intends to operate another new flight to Los Angeles in the spring of 2014, which will be the airline’s third destination in the United States, after Washington and New York.