Icelandic airline Play is to take delivery of four new Airbus aircraft this winter to allow the start-up transatlantic carrier to further expand services from spring 2023.
The four new A320/321neo aircraft will bring Play’s fleet up to 10 in time for the summer 2023 schedule when it plans to grow its transatlantic “hub and spoke” model connecting Europe with the US via its Reykjavik hub.
Play, which launched transatlantic services in spring 2022, carried 110,000 passengers in July, which was a 25 per cent increase on June’s traffic, as it operated six aircraft to 25 destinations on both sides of the Atlantic. The airline’s load factor also rose to 87.9 per cent in July, compared with 79.2 per cent in June.
Birgir Jonsson, CEO of Play, said: “It’s been great seeing so many new destinations and the full transatlantic network come into play over the past few weeks, and the positive effect it has had on our network.”
Jonsson added that its flow of future bookings was “strong” and the airline was now benefiting from a fall in fuel prices.