- British Airways is the latest to jump on the Eastern Europe bandwagon amid a flurry of new summer flights. BA will connect its London Heathrow hub with Gdansk and Wroclaw in Poland; Riga, Latvia; and Cluj-Napoca, Romania, from July. Flights will operate through the summer. All four cities are new additions to BA’s map.
- Taking aim at the heart of AirBaltic, European discounter Ryanair will open a new base in Riga from October. The Irish carrier will launch 14 new routes to destinations in Denmark, France, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Norway, Poland, Spain, Sweden, Ukraine and the UK. Two summer routes to Frankfurt Hahn and Venice Treviso will be extended through the winter. Ryanair will initially base two Boeing 737s in Riga.
- Spirit Airlines is giving Kansas City denizens more options to Florida. The discounter will add new nonstops to Fort Myers and Tampa, as well as resuming flights to Fort Lauderdale, in June. The additions come as airlines prepare for what could be a strong U.S. domestic leisure travel season this summer.
- Sun Country Airlines is keeping its promise to growth with the proceeds from its IPO in March. The Minneapolis-based discounter will add nine new airports, plus 18 new routes, to its map from August through February 2022. New destinations include: Duluth and Rochester, Minn.; Grand Cayman; Green Bay and Milwaukee, Wis.; Phoenix-Mesa; Punta Gorda and St. Pete-Clearwater, Fla.; and Providenciales, Turks and Caicos. One seeming winner is Duluth where Sun Country launched connecting bus service to its Minneapolis-St. Paul hub in 2019 with an aim of building the market to support future air service.
Edward Russell
May 3rd, 2021