Dhaka from US
 

Hi all,

What is the best route from the US to Dhaka. You can use your own definition of "best", but please explain.

Cheers,
Cody

If you're interested in oneworld only, your options are a little limited. The only current oneworld carrier that flies to Dhaka is DragonAir, a Cathay Pacific subsidiary. You can get to Hong Kong through a variety of oneworld carriers from the US. Kingfisher will soon be a oneworld member, but they only currently fly to CCU (Calcutta/Kolkata) from Dhaka. If you want to get "close" to Dhaka on other oneworld carriers, you can get to CCU on AA (AA metal to DEL, codeshare to CCU), from where you can either fly another airline or go overland.

If you don't feel like restricting yourself to oneworld, there are a few other one-stop options:
Transatlantic: Emirates, Etihad, Saudi and Qatar all fly through their respective hubs from select US cities.
Transpacific: Thai flies from LAX via Bangkok.

Hope that helps!

Many thanks Eric - that definitely helps. Either way, it is one looong journey!

I travel to Dhaka a couple of times a year. I have gone several ways and Dragonair through HKG is by far the best way to handle that long trip. I usually overnight at NRT and then head on down the next morning to HKG and on to DAC arriving at about 9PM.
I try to use Cathay for as many of the segments as possible as CP is far better in my opinion than AA or JL.

You can also connect in DEL on Jet Airways but it is a nasty layover in DEL.

Good Luck!

Why do you go through NRT when you could go straight to Hong Kong from the US? Are the flight times weird?

There are several reasons. Pricing, it is usually 2K cheaper, even more this past trip in Oct/Nov as JL really discounted the J class seats. Scheduling, the direct flights to HKG that allow same day connection to DAC arrive between 4 and 6 in the morning, providing a very long day hanging out in the CX lounge. They have 4 great lounges at HKG but 12 hours is hard to do. Hotels at NRT are very reasonable and I use that night to get on the new time schedule so I am ready for work in the morning after a 9pm arrival in DAC.

I see - that makes a lot of sense. Many thanks for the input!