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A woman has been left distraught after her dog died while being transported on a flight from Sydney to Brisbane. Kay Newman said that her boxer, named Duke, was left on the tarmac with no shade for more than an hour after her flight was delayed. On December 19, when it was close to 40 degrees in Sydney, Newman voiced her concerns to the airline but was assured Duke would be outside for only a few minutes. Airline procedure is to load animals last and unload them first. Newman said she was given permission to wait with Duke in the airconditioned office until the last possible minute before he was placed in his crate for the flight. "When I arrived at the boarding gates, I could see Duke's crate already on the tarmac. I'm not sure how long he'd already been there but as I watched, five, ten, fifteen minutes passed, and he was still out there, in the crate, in that heat. I alerted Qantas staff of my concerns over Duke being out in the heat, but I was assured that he was fine and would be loaded shortly." She said she became extremely distressed and started to cry only to be told via a phone call to the ground crew that her dog was fine. When she landed in Brisbane, her worst fears were realised Newman said she had been in constant contact with Qantas in the weeks since the incident, prompting her to start an online petition into the airline's animal handling procedures. "We have expressed our sympathies to Kay about the passing of her dog, Duke," a Qantas spokesperson said. "There was an unexpected delay with the flight which meant he was on the tarmac for longer than usual but our baggage handlers said Duke was fine when he was loaded onto the aircraft."<br/>

Qatar Airways and German rail company Deutsche Bahn have signed a codeshare agreement that will enable the Middle Eastern carrier’s passengers to connect from Frankfurt to eight cities across Germany. The pact will enable Qatar Airways’ passengers to take rail connections from Frankfurt to Cologne, Dusseldorf, Hamburg, Hannover, Leipzig, Munich, Nuremberg and Stuttgart. Qatar Airways operates twice-daily service from its Doha base to both Frankfurt and Munich, as well as a daily flight from Doha to Berlin. Cirium schedules data shows that Qatar Airways is the only airline to serve the three German cities from Doha. Lufthansa ended its flights between Germany and Qatar in 2017. The announcement follows reports in the German press last month which quoted Qatar Airways CE Akbar Al Baker as saying he would like to co-operate with Lufthansa. The two airlines do not currently have a codeshare agreement and Lufthansa has in the past been vocal in its criticism of Gulf carriers including Qatar Airways what it sees as unfair competition resulting from alleged state subsidies. Al Baker states that the agreement with Deutsche Bahn “further strengthens the ties between Germany and Qatar”, noting that Qatar Airways has seen “significant growing demand” for flights between the two countries.<br/>