Ryanair to open three new bases in Greece in S21

Ryanair (FR, Dublin Int’l) has announced that it will open two entirely new bases in Greece, at Kerkyra and Rhodes airports, as well as reopen its Chania base, closed in 2018, as it bets on a rapid resurgence in summer leisure traffic. The opening of the bases will bring about a total of 46 new routes. All three bases are scheduled to open in July 2021 and will initially be seasonal, operating through October 2021. “Greece is proving to be a resilient destination and is determined to lead the way in tourism recovery as we walk away from the COVID-19 pandemic. Following the announcement of the first travel corridors with Israel and Cyprus in April and the official re-opening to all international travel from May 14, we are proud to support the resurgence of the country’s tourism industry and to offer both Greek visitors and customers greater choice and even lower fares,” Ryanair’s Commercial Director Jason McGuinness said. The Irish low-cost carrier plans to base two aircraft out of Kerkyra. It will launch eighteen new routes out of the airport, to: Aarhus, Copenhagen Kastrup, Düsseldorf Int’l, Münster/Osnabrück, Wroclaw, Kraków, Nuremberg, Karlsruhe/Baden-Baden, Milan Malpensa, Verona, Marseilles, Barcelona El Prat, Odesa, Sibiu, Santorini, Heraklion, Paphos, and Tel Aviv Ben Gurion. Ryanair plans to base one B737 each out of Rhodes and Chania. Out of the former, it will add 13 new routes to: Dublin Int’l, Birmingham Int’l, Warsaw Modlin, Memmingen, Venice Treviso, Suceava, Marseilles, Barcelona, Brindisi, Thessaloniki, Heraklion, Paphos, and Tel Aviv. Out of the latter, it will launch 15 new services, to: Newcastle, GB, Leeds/Bradford, Billund, Bremen Hans Koschnick, Berlin Brandenburg Int’l, Cologne/Bonn, Kyiv Boryspil, Budapest, Venice Treviso, Bologna, Rome Ciampino, Bari, Mykonos, Malta Int’l, and Tel Aviv. Meanwhile, Ryanair Holdings Chief Executive Michael O’Leary said during a press conference that the carrier hopes to start taking its first B737-8-200s in April 2021. The type has yet to be certified and although Ryanair initially hoped that it would happen by the end of March, this timeline is no longer feasible. O’Leary said that he expected FAA and EASA certifications within the first days of April, which would then pave the way for the delivery of the first eight units in April and another eight in May 2021.