- Ryanair to add 20pc more flights in Germany
- Extra routes planned for Hamburg base opening next month
- Dublin 5w among to continue into summer
Ryanair will open a two-aircraft base in Hamburg next month and add 10 new routes next summer in the wake of Air Berlin’s retreat from the airport, as part of Ryanair strategy to grow market share in Germany to 20pc.
New routes include Faro 3w and Thessaloniki 3w while services extended into summer to take the total to 14 include Brussels (2 daily), Dublin 5w, Gran Canaria 2w, Stansted (2 daily), Manchester (daily), Milan Bergamo (daily) & Sofia 2w.
In Cologne Ryanair are adding a new 4w summer service to Sofia, making it 21 routes in total, including Berlin x 5 daily and 137 weekly flights.
In Nuremberg Ryanair added four new routes to Bari, Madrid, Palermo and Porto, and five new summer services to Budapest, Malta, Manchester, Milan and Rome (12 routes in total).
Ryanair is to station four additional aircraft at Berlin Schoenefeld, for a total of nine, and will open a base at Nuremberg on Nov. 1 where it will locate one plane and serve six winter routes.
Last week Air Berlin announced the closure of its Hamburg base and five others as it halves its fleet to 75 and cuts 1,200 jobs, offering an opportunity for Ryanair to overtake them and move into second place behind Lufthansa in the German market. Germany is Ryanair’s fourth-largest market and with 112m annual flights is Europe’s second largest, behind England (121m) and ahead of Spain (105m), Italy (82m) and France (72m).
Ryanair said that an arrangement under which Air Berlin plans to operate 40 surplus jets on behalf of Deutsche Lufthansa AG, the biggest German carrier, for five years is both negative for consumers and of dubious legality from an antitrust standpoint. Lufthansa is also seeking to build up the fleet of its Eurowings discount arm
Chief Operations Officer David O’Brien said “there are questions on the legitimacy of any bogus merger. We have yet to see the details, but it could well be that the European Union could become interested.”
Kenny Jacobs said “we know that the Ryanair offer will win through in the German market regardless of what happens to Air Berlin. Some other carriers look artificially good because of the low oil price and also could be vulnerable.
Questioned about sterling Kenny Jacobs said if the currency remains weak into 2017, English tourists will have found out their pound doesn’t go as far as the year before. Then we will start to see a type of contraction in their general economic condition,”
David O’Brien said “the weaker pound is not going to suddenly stimulate a lot of people in Hamburg to choose Newcastle instead of Palma de Mallorca,” at a briefing at Hamburg airport. London is a fantastic touristic destination and yes, other parts of England have their merits, but is it going to make people choose England over Greece, Italy? I don’t think so.”
- Hamburg announcement here
- German announcement here
- Cologne announcement here
- Nuremberg announcement here.
