Azores, Ryanair in talks over Ponta Delgada, Terceira

easyJet to open seasonal Alicante base from 2Q24

easyJet (London Luton) has announced that it will launch a seasonal, summer-only base at Alicante airport in spring 2024.

The low-cost carrier said easyJet Europe (EC, Vienna) would deploy three A320-200s to the southern Spanish airport. It will allow it to increase the capacity offered during the Summer 2024 season by around 16% compared to the current capacity, provided by aircraft based elsewhere.

easyJet has been serving Alicante since 1999 without having a base at the airport. The ch-aviation capacities module shows it currently has an 11.7% market share by scheduled weekly departure capacity out of the airport (operated mainly by easyJet UK), trailing behind Ryanair but ahead of base carriers Vueling Airlines and Jet2 (United Kingdom).

The airline did not disclose its network plans related to the base launch.

Alicante will be easyJet Europe's fourth base in Spain, following Barcelona El Prat, Malaga, and Palma de Mallorca. Only the Barcelona base is year-round.

EU court annuls Italian state aid approval

Ryanair (FR, Dublin International) has welcomed a ruling at the General Court, Europe’s second-highest court, on state aid favouring Italian airlines during the Covid-19 pandemic. The court backed the low-cost carrier’s challenge and annulled the European Commission-approved aid.

In October 2020, the EU competition authority allowed Italy to give EUR130 million euros (USD140 million) in subsidies to airlines holding an Italian operating licence. As ch-aviation reported at the time, while the country’s then-flag carrier Alitalia had received EUR199.45 million (USD213.6 million) in Brussels-backed state support in September 2020, three other local carriers, Air Dolomiti, Blue Panorama Airlines, and Neos Air, appealed to the Italian government “to act as quickly as possible” to release the newly-approved EUR130 million.

However, in its May 24 ruling the Luxembourg-based court said that the authority had “failed to provide a statement of reasons for its finding that the measure at issue was not contrary to EU law provisions other than those governing state aid.”

The court explained that “according to settled case-law, a decision not...

Ryanair's Buzz deploys only B737-700 on leisure charters

easyJet to open Birmingham base in 2Q24, grows fleet

easyJet (London Luton) has announced it is expanding its UK network by opening a new three-A320-200 base at Birmingham, GB in March 2024, marking its first UK base opening since the Covid-19 pandemic.

The move follows easyJet's return to growth in the UK this summer, where it will operate its largest UK flying programme to date with around 8% more capacity than pre-pandemic, flying one million more seats and operating 57 new routes, including 23 from the UK, the airline said in a statement.

The budget carrier said the new base - its ninth in the UK - would strengthen its position in the UK market and enable it to launch more new routes to some of Europe's most popular leisure destinations next year. More details were not disclosed. easyJet already serves key domestic and international routes from Birmingham, including Amsterdam Schiphol (Netherlands), Geneva (Switzerland), Milan Malpensa and Naples Capodichino (Italy), Lisbon and Faro (Portugal), and Palma de Mallorca (Spain). easyJet's eight other bases...