Aer Lingus Regional to add 100,000 seats on Shannon services next year

Aer Lingus Regional plans to add 100,000 extra seats from Shannon Airport next year through adding a new route and expanding a number of existng services.

Aer Arann, which operates the larger airline's regional services in Ireland and Britain, said yesterday that it plans to add new daily flights between Shannon and Bristol in south west England from April 3rd.

The airline said yesterday that its move is directly the Government decision to axe the 3 per cent travel tax from next April, which it announced last October in the Budget.

Its chief commercial officer, Simon Fagan, said that Bristol is already a popular destination from its other airports. The airline hopes to carry 25,000 on the service next year.

Along with the Bristol route, Aer Arann intends to increase the number of daily flights on its Shannon-Birmingham route to two. It will increase the number of flights on Shannon-Manchester to three every day from two.

The airline is also selling the services to British travellers on the grounds that Shannon offers pre-clearance for those flying the US. Aer Lingus will serve Boston and New York from there next year.

Shannon chief executive, Neil Pakey, welcomed the news, pointing out that it had had a positive start to life as an independent airport with summer passenger numbers recording month-on-month increases on 2012 of close to 10 per cent, with a 40 per cent jump on its transatlantic services.