Aer Lingus was well on its way to meeting its first-year target of half a million passengers flying from Belfast International Airport, chief executive Dermot Mannion said yesterday at the inauguration of its first routes from the new hub.

The first flight from the airport, commonly known as Aldergrove and located about 18 miles from Belfast, took off for Amsterdam at 6.15am yesterday.

In all, the company is opening up nine routes. The Heathrow service will begin on January 14th with services to Geneva, Faro, Budapest, Malaga, Rome and Nice all operational by the late spring of 2008.

Mr Mannion expressed confidence that Aer Lingus's £100 million investment in transferring operations from Shannon to Aldergrove would be a commercial success. He said the new base, its first outside the Republic, was supporting 100 direct jobs as well as 500 indirect jobs. Three new Airbus A320 aircraft will be based in Belfast.

Mr Mannion said the company was on its way to meeting its target of carrying more than 500,000 passengers in its first year of operations. Before the first flight left Belfast yesterday, he said, the company had notched up 55,000 ticket sales.

"We are very satisfied with that. We are off to a good start."

He said the peace and prosperity Northern Ireland was now enjoying "was a huge incentive" for Aer Lingus to set up its first base outside the Republic.

"In that context Aer Lingus is staking its claim to become the airline of choice for all communities on this island," he added.

Mr Mannion said the move from Shannon to Belfast was a very difficult decision which "was absolutely made on commercial grounds". He said Aer Lingus was "still very heavily committed to Shannon".

He did not dismiss the possibility of running a transatlantic service out of Belfast, when its current services were solidly established.