EasyJet cutting routes, staff as flights resume

easyJet (U2, London Luton) will resume flights in mid-June, but will cut routes and a third of its staff as it struggles to deal with the fallout from the coronavirus pandemic. In an update on capacity, fleet and cost structure plans, the carrier on May 28 said flights will resume on June 15, servicing a small number of routes that will support profitable flying. easyJet’s fleet was fully grounded on March 30. The initial schedule will comprise mainly domestic flying in the UK and France and further routes will be announced as travel restrictions are relaxed. Capacity for the fiscal fourth quarter of 2020 will be around 30% of that in the same period last year. On May 21, easyJet said the services that will resume from June 15 include from London Gatwick, Bristol Int’l, Birmingham Int’l, Liverpool, Newcastle, GB, Edinburgh, Glasgow Int’l, Inverness, and Belfast Int’l in the UK as well as the Isle of Man. In addition, flying will resume in France from Nice, Paris CDG, Toulouse Blagnac, Bordeaux, Nantes, Lyon St. Exupéry and Lille, as well as from Geneva in Switzerland, Lisbon and Porto in Portugal, and Barcelona El Prat in Spain. In line with reduced demand and scaled back operations, easyJet has proposed reducing its staff by up to 30%, amounting to about 4,500 people considering the airline employs some 15,000 staff, including 4,000 pilots and 9,000 cabin crew.