Aer Lingus has announced its route schedule from Belfast International Airport this afternoon (7 August) following the announcement that it was to set up a base in Northern Ireland.
Belfast will be Aer Lingus” first base outside the Republic and comes at a time of great optimism and business confidence in the city, following the recent peace accord.
The new routes ” including lucrative Heathrow flights on which British Airways (BA) will place its code ” are: Belfast to Amsterdam (14 weekly), Barcelona (5), Geneva (2), Heathrow (21), Rome (4), Budapest (3), Malaga (4) and Faro (3) start progressively from December this year until February, 2008.
News of the deal with BA also sees the UK carrier back on Belfast services ” albeit only as a codeshare deal with Aer Lingus. BA does not operate any flights to Belfast following its sale of BA Connect to Flybe, although the latter now has substantial business at George Best City Belfast Airport along with bmi.
Aer Lingus will base three Airbus A320 aircraft at Belfast International, with the company expecting up to 1m passengers to use the new services that will also see investment of ”150m ($206m) and 100 new flight and cabin crew jobs created.
The Irish carrier has rearranged its schedule to allow for the substantial new London services, by dropping its Heathrow-Shannon flights from 13 January, 2008, noting that the UK capital gateway represents ”an accelerated growth opportunity.” Heathrow and Amsterdam Schiphol flights will also be timed to connect with a range of international departures with BA and KLM.
News of Belfast International expansion comes at a good time for aviation in the city as Ryanair recently announced three new routes from George Best City Airport to East Midlands, Glasgow and Liverpool from November, with an airport spokesman also noting: ”They have promised us a host of European routes next summer,” although their detail is as yet unclear.
Aer Arran ” sponsors of Sunderland”s recent pre-season tour to Ireland ” fly from Cork ” home of Sunderland manager Roy Keane ” to Belfast City, while Air Berlin also flies to City from London Stansted. EasyJet also has a substantial operation out of Belfast International.