Etihad Extends Riyadh and Dammam Suspensions to November 19 as Saudi Routes From UAE Stay Disrupted

Air travellers in the UAE are facing an uneven operating picture, with delays at Dubai International Airport and Abu Dhabi and cancellations on several routes between the UAE and Saudi Arabia. Airlines are gradually restoring international services ahead of the winter travel season, but regional security concerns continue to affect schedules, particularly connections to Riyadh and Dammam.

Etihad Airways has cancelled all passenger and cargo flights between Abu Dhabi and both Dammam and Riyadh through Thursday, November 19. Flights EY601, EY602, EY603 and EY604 between Abu Dhabi and Jeddah are scheduled to resume on Friday, November 6, while other Abu Dhabi-Jeddah flights are due to operate as normal. The airline says the situation remains dynamic and further changes are possible.

Emirates is listed as having cancelled Dubai-Dammam flights EK821, EK823, EK825 and EK827. flydubai's Saudi network shows a mix of scheduled, estimated and operating flights, including services to Medina, Ha'il and Jeddah; no status information was available for several other Saudi destinations, which does not necessarily mean those routes are cancelled. Air Arabia has cancelled Sharjah-Abha flight G9195 and Sharjah-Riyadh flights G9151 and G9154.

Other international carriers have extended suspensions or postponed launches: IndiGo (Riyadh, Jeddah, Dammam and Madinah until November 14), Akasa Air (Jeddah until November 18, Riyadh until November 30), Lufthansa (Riyadh until November 18, Dammam until November 30), Air France (Riyadh until November 14), KLM (Riyadh and Dammam until November 27), Cathay Pacific (Riyadh until January 31, 2027), Philippine Airlines (PR654 and PR655 until November 29), ITA Airways (Riyadh until November 18) and Scoot (Singapore-Jeddah until December 2). Singapore Airlines has postponed its non-stop Riyadh service.

The backdrop is the US-Iran conflict. On November 3, Washington and Tehran remained far apart on a deal despite indirect talks, with Qatar continuing to mediate. On November 5, the UK Maritime Trade Operations agency reported a tanker hit by two unidentified projectiles about 50 nautical miles north of Qatar; crew condition and damage were not immediately known.

Separately, several European flights reported suspected bomb threats on November 5, including a Finnair Helsinki-Rome flight escorted by a fighter jet, a Wizz Air Milan-Warsaw flight diverted to Vienna, and a Dublin-Rome flight diverted to France. These incidents are unrelated to the US-Iran conflict. Emirates also now requires passengers travelling to or transiting the United States to sign an attestation form confirming they have not visited the Democratic Republic of the Congo in the preceding 21 days.

The spread of restart dates across carriers is the clearest signal in this picture. Cancellations run from November 14 for IndiGo and Air France to January 31, 2027 for Cathay Pacific, and each airline is setting its own date. For corridors into Riyadh and Dammam, that means capacity does not come back as a block: a route can be dark on one carrier while another operates it, and the same airport pair can differ by weeks depending on the airline.

For operators and planners, the practical consequence is that a Saudi routing has to be checked flight by flight. Etihad's own wording — dynamic, with further changes possible — means the November 19 date is a working assumption rather than a fixed restart. Jeddah appears to be recovering faster than Riyadh and Dammam on the Abu Dhabi side, with the EY601-604 services due back on November 6 while the other two cities stay suspended.

The next markers are the carrier-specific dates already published: IndiGo and Air France on November 14, then Akasa Air, Lufthansa and ITA Airways on November 18, then Etihad on November 19. Whether those dates hold, or are pushed out again, will show how the security situation is being read at airline level.