Three more routes axed
Austrian Airlines today (February 17) announced further cuts including the axing of three routes.
The airline, which is in the process of being taken over by Lufthansa, said it would end its services to Nuremberg, Ankara and Nizhny Novgorod next month.
There will also be cuts in frequencies "across the network."
Austrian said the latest cuts amounted to 5% of its production. With cuts announced earlier, the carrier will have reduced capacity in 2009 by 10% compared to 2008.
The cuts come as Austrian reported a continuing fall in passenger volume.
It said that in January it carried 623,000 passengers, a 13% drop compared with January 2008.
Its load factor fell by 4.3% to 65.4%.
There was a 13.1% fall in its short- and medium-haul market compared to January 2008. This included a 10.5% drop on services on East Europe and a 14.7% fall in West Europe.
Its long-haul market, in which its Chicago service has been cancelled, fell by 12.1% while revenue passenger per kilometre dropped by 17.9%.
The load factor fell by 5.1% to 72.8%.
Lufthansa has offered €366,268 for the Austrian government's 41.6% stake in its national carrier.
But the EC last week announced an investigation into the proposed take over after expressing "doubts" about elements of it.
www.aua.com