by Lufthansa Flyer | Sep 29, 2016 | Air Berlin, Corporate, Eurowings, Featured |
What we knew would happen for weeks has become official. Lufthansa has entered a Letter of Intent with Air Berlin to assume a wet-lease for 40 Air Berlin aircraft, complete with Air Berlin crews to operate the flights. The aircraft will enter service on March 26, 2017, coinciding with the beginning of Lufthansa’s Summer timetable. 35 of the aircraft will be repainted to the Eurowings livery, while the remain 5 will fly under Austrian’s colors. Specifically, the lease involves 29 Airbus 320 and 11 Airbus A319 aircraft.
The decision was made after Lufthansa approached Air Berlin with an offer to help reduce some of the stress that Air Berlin is under due to mounting losses. Of course LH was not completely altruistic with the offer since there would be a substantial benefit to Eurowings, both in the growth of the fleet and the reduction of competition in the German LCC market.
Lufthansa will operate the aircraft on existing Air Berlin routes except those that serve Dusseldorf or Berlin. Air Berlin will continue to operate out these major hubs. However I do expect that a few tweaks will be made to the timetable to take into account existing routes already being flown by Eurowings.
Under wet lease agreements, the operating airline pays ‘rent’ for the aircraft and assumes all other responsibilities for the aircraft including maintenance etc. Any profits or losses remain with the airline leasing the aircraft, obviously in this case it is Lufthansa.
The ‘Letter of Intent’ announcement came from the Supervisory Board of the Lufthansa Group. The board held a regularly scheduled meeting on Wednesday (28 September) to discuss various proposals and strategy initiatives. Another major announcement that came from the Board was the approval for the Lufthansa Group to purchase the remaining 55 percent stake that it did not already own in Brussels Airlines.
by Lufthansa Flyer | Sep 28, 2016 | Brussels, Corporate, Featured, Lufthansa |
Lufthansa Group’s Supervisory Board has voted to approve the acquisition of the remain share of Brussels Airlines that it previously did not own, making ‘SN’ a fully owned by the Airline Group. Up until today, Lufthansa Group had owned only 45% of SN. This decision was fully expected.
The deal is expected to be closed by the beginning of 2017.
What happens from here with Brussels remains interesting. One leading idea floating around Lufthansa Group is a plan to meld Brussels into the Eurowings LCC division to bolster EW’s position among LCC carriers in Europe. With Brussel’s 51 aircraft, most of which are short to medium haul specialists, it would seem to be the likely scenario now that LH controls all of Brussels. I
in addition to the 43 short and medium haul aircraft in Brussels’ hangar, they also operate 8 A330 aircraft which would be critically important to EW as plans exist to expand EW’s long haul network next year.
BUT…..
What may change this original plan was the recent news announcing Lufthansa will wet least 40 aircraft from Air Berlin and take over a substantial portion of Air Berlin’s routes in Europe that do not involve AB’s hubs in Dusseldorf and Berlin.
IF both plans come to fruition, we may see Eurowings go from a small LCC with only 34 aircraft and turn into a European LCC powerhouse with upwards of 125 aircraft in the fleet virtually overnight. This would allow EW to take a realistic run at competitors such as Ryanair and Easyjet and have it happen in fairly short order. Which has been the plan along if you ask anyone at Lufthansa.
by Lufthansa Flyer | Sep 28, 2016 | Brussels, Featured, Route Announcements |
BRUSSELS has announced it will begin service for the first time to Yerevan, Armenia beginning with their Spring/Summer 2017 timetable. The new service will be a combination of either once-weekly or twice-weekly flights depending on the month.
The planned schedule is as follows, beginning March 31:
Brussels will operate weekly flights between Brussels and Yerevan throughout the year. Flight SN2899 will depart Brussels at 9:25p on Fridays, and arrive in Yerevan at 3:55a the following morning. The return flight from Yerevan will take place on Saturdays, operating as SN2900 and will depart Yerevan at 4:45a and arrive in Brussels at 7:45a.
In addition to this once-weekly flight, SN will add a second weekly flight in July and August due to an expected increase in demand for the summer holiday season. This second flight will operate as SN2899 departing Brussels on Tuesdays at 9:25a, arriving in Yerevan at 3:55a the following morning. The return flight will operate as SN2900 and will take place on Wednesdays with a departure time of 4:45a from Yerevan, arriving in Brussels at 7:45a.
Reservations are now open for these flights.
