It seems that Ryanair is having trouble weathering the current storm, with the airline planning to cut into its planned operation for September and October.
Ryanair Boeing 737-800 coming into land at Dublin Airport – Image, Economy Class and Beyond
The cuts will see a drop in flights by about 20%.
The airline notes that forward bookings have notably weakened over the last 10 days, given continuing uncertainty over recent COVID-19 case rates in some EU countries.
In terms of cuts, Ryanair will choose to reduce frequencies, rather than suspend routes.
Countries that will be affected include Spain, France and Sweden, where rising recent COVID case rates have led to increased travel restrictions, and Ireland who maintains their Green List.
In quotes
A spokesperson for Ryanair said
“These capacity cuts and frequency reductions for the months of Sept & Oct are necessary given the recent weakness in forward bookings due to Covid restrictions in a number of EU countries. Any effected passengers in Sept received email notification earlier today advising them of their options. Similar communications will be issued to the small number of affected passengers in Oct later today. Over the past 2 weeks as a number of EU countries have raised travel restrictions, forward bookings especially for business travel into Sept & Oct have been negatively affected, and it makes sense to reduce frequencies so that we tailor our capacity to demand over the next 2 months.
Proper testing at airports, and effective tracing (as is being conducted in Germany and Italy) is the only realistic and proportionate method of supervising safe intra-EU air travel while effectively limiting the spread of the Covid-19 virus.”
Trying to plan ahead
It goes without saying that travel is very much in flux, with countries chopping and changing quarantines – and in turn making the travelling public think again if they want to travel.
And as we head into the next few critical months, there could be a lot more changes to schedules – not just for Ryanair, but for other airlines too.
2020 has many more curveballs ahead…
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