Lufthansa Group Pushes Dubai Restart to November 25 Amid Middle East Volatility

Lufthansa, SWISS and Eurowings will not return to Dubai until November 25, 2026, a month later than planned, after the group judged the situation in the Middle East too unsettled to resume service. The three carriers jointly confirmed the postponement on October 23, 2026.

Lufthansa and SWISS had been scheduled to restart their Dubai service on October 25, 2026, while Eurowings was due to follow on November 1. None of the three airlines has flown to Dubai since March 2026, meaning the new date extends the suspension to roughly eight months. The airlines said the decision was made "in light of the current situation and outlook in the Middle East".

What happens to affected passengers?

Lufthansa said its carriers will contact affected passengers directly and offer flexible rebooking options or a full refund. That commitment covers every booking made against the October 25 and November 1 restart dates, both of which are now void.

The group framed the delay as a precaution rather than a cancellation. "The Lufthansa Group continuously monitors and evaluates the situation in the Middle East and is in close contact with the relevant authorities," the company said in a statement. "The safety of passengers and crew is always the top priority for the Lufthansa Group. Due to the continued volatility of the situation in the region, short-notice adjustments to individual routes may be necessary."

The last sentence is the operative one. It signals that even the November 25 date carries no guarantee, and that further route-level changes can arrive without warning. Passengers and corporate travel buyers should treat the winter Dubai schedule as provisional.

How large will the Dubai operation be?

The 2026/2027 winter schedule, as planned, concentrates capacity on the group's hub and capital-city gateways:

• Lufthansa: up to five weekly flights each from Frankfurt (FRA) and Munich (MUC), a combined ten per week
• SWISS: daily service from Zurich (ZRH), seven per week
• Eurowings: daily service from Berlin (BER), seven per week
• Austrian Airlines: five weekly flights from Vienna (VIE), starting December 12, 2026

At peak operation, the group's carriers would offer up to 28 weekly flights to and from Dubai — an average of four per day across the five gateways. Austrian's December 12 start date stands, at least for now, though the group's own caveat about short-notice adjustments applies equally to Vienna.

Which routes have been cut outright?

Eurowings will not operate its planned flights from Cologne/Bonn and Stuttgart to Dubai during the 2026/2027 winter schedule at all. Unlike the hub routes, these are suspensions rather than deferrals, and they narrow Eurowings' Dubai presence to the Berlin service alone.

The distinction matters commercially. Dubai routes from secondary German cities rely heavily on leisure and visiting-friends-and-relatives traffic, segments that are slower to return after an eight-month gap and more price-sensitive when they do. Cutting Cologne/Bonn and Stuttgart for the full season concentrates the remaining risk on trunk routes where feeder networks can backfill demand.

What comes next?

The group says it continues to evaluate the region alongside the relevant authorities, and the November 25 restart now serves as the next checkpoint for a network that has been dark since March. Whether the full 28-weekly-flight program survives contact with the region's volatility will become clear one schedule revision at a time.