Transatlantic flights return to Ottawa airport with Paris flight
Ottawa's airport is getting a transatlantic flight for the first time in nearly three years.
Air France is launching a new route between Ottawa and Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport, the airline announced Thursday. Five weekly non-stop flights between the two cities will run starting June 27.
It's the first direct flight from Ottawa to a European city since the COVID-19 pandemic wiped out the airport's international routes.
International flights to Ottawa ceased during the pandemic. Federal rules meant international flights were restricted to four Canadian airports: Montreal, Toronto, Calgary and Vancouver.
Direct flights to some U.S. and Caribbean destinations have returned to Ottawa airport, but the Paris flight is the first European destination. Air Canada used to run direct flights from Ottawa to London and Frankfurt, but those have not resumed.
"We applaud Air France for capitalizing on the substantial demand for non-stop YOW-Europe service," Mark Laroche, the Ottawa International Airport Authority's president and CEO, said in a news release.
"Not only is Paris a long-standing popular destination for residents and business travellers in the Ottawa-Gatineau region, Air France’s global connectivity from Paris-Charles de Gaulle Airport is world-renowned, with connections to Europe, the Middle East, South Asia, Africa, and beyond."
The Paris-Ottawa flight will operate on Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays, Saturdays and Sundays on Air France's 224-seater Airbus A-330.
Air France also said it's resuming its Paris-Quebec City service in May and increasing the number of flights to Paris from Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver.
Air France's free shuttle between Montreal's Trudeau Airport and Ottawa will continue to run twice a day.
Ottawa Mayor Mark Sutcliffe said on Twitter the announcement is "great news for Ottawa's economy."
Gatineau MP Steven MacKinnon called the announcement excellent news for Gatineau residents who are travelling to Europe, Lebanon and Africa.
And local tourism officials said the flights would make it easier for visitors from France and other overseas markets to travel to Ottawa.
"This will mean greater and easier access to our beautiful region, and will certainly give a boost to the tourism industry on both sides of the river," Julie Kinnear, president of Tourisme Outaouais, said in the release.
CTVNews.ca Top Stories
For the first time in report's history, Canada's air quality worse than U.S.
Thanks to wildfires, air quality in Canada is now worse than in the U.S., according to the 6th Annual World Air Quality Report.
A newspaper says video of Prince William and Kate should halt royal rumour mill. That's a tall order
Prince William and his wife Catherine have been filmed at a farm shop near their Windsor home, The Sun newspaper reported -- the first footage of Kate since she had abdominal surgery for an unspecified condition two months ago.
'You ask for your money, they disappear': Ontario man loses $17K to AI crypto scam
A Toronto man is spreading the word of a cryptocurrency scam that lures victims using AI-generated news sites after he lost $17,000 in investments.
DEVELOPING Canada's annual inflation rate ticked down to 2.8 per cent in February, defying expectations
Statistics Canada says the annual inflation rate edged down to 2.8 per cent in February.
Hertz CEO out following electric car 'horror show'
The company, which announced in January it was selling 20,000 of the electric vehicles in its fleet, or about a third of the EVs it owned, is now replacing the CEO who helped build up that fleet, giving it the company’s fifth boss in just four years.
High thoughts: The habits of Canadian cannabis users are revealed in a new StatCan report
Statistics Canada has conducted a series of surveys to measure the impacts of legalized cannabis since the Cannabis Act took effect in 2018. The latest one, the 2023 National Cannabis Survey, sheds light on users' preferences and habits last year.
Demand soars for solar eclipse glasses in Canada. Are they worth buying?
The demand for total solar eclipse glasses used to safely view the rare celestial event has been ramping up as sellers, along with astronomy and eye-care experts in Canada, warn that viewing the eclipse with the naked eye is dangerous.
Trump says Jews who vote for Democrats 'hate Israel' and their religion
Former U.S. president Donald Trump on Monday charged that Jews who vote for Democrats 'hate Israel' and hate 'their religion,' igniting a firestorm of criticism from the White House and Jewish leaders.
Toronto family doctor who called patient's body 'perfect' suspended for 3 months: tribunal
A family doctor in Toronto has been suspended for three months after a disciplinary tribunal found that he failed to follow proper protocols while examining a patient's breasts and made inappropriate comments about her body.