Irish no-frills airline Ryanair cuts back winter flights

By Shawn Pogatchnik, The Associated Press

DUBLIN, Ireland - No-frills airline Ryanair said Thursday it will withdraw nearly a third of its aircraft from its major London base and suspend operations at seven other European airports because of sky-high fuel costs and its failure to negotiate lower airport fees.

This will be the second straight year that Ryanair Holdings PLC reduces its activities at Stansted Airport for its winter season running from October to March, as soaring fuel costs and dropping consumer demand continue to bite.

Ryanair said it would operate 28 aircraft at Stansted starting in October, down from the current 40. Chief executive Michael O'Leary told a London news conference he expects the cuts to cost 900 jobs at the airport northeast of London, including 150 Ryanair employees.

Separately, Ryanair announced it will cancel its services from Nov. 4 to Dec. 19 at seven destinations: Basel in Switzerland; the Hungarian capital, Budapest; the Polish cities of Krakow and Rzeszow; Palma and Valencia in Spain; and Salzburg in Austria.

And the Dublin-based airline warned of further disruptions if those airports don't discount their fees during low-demand periods.

Deputy chief executive Michael Cawley said those bases were being temporarily shut because "high airport charges, and the massive increases which we face in fuel prices, makes it more profitable for Ryanair to ground aircraft rather than fly them at these airports during this period."

Officials at the targeted airports characterized Ryanair's claims as distorted and cynical.

Domokos Szollar, spokesman for Budapest Airport, said Ryanair pursued no serious negotiations, but merely sent a "form letter" to it and several other airports demanding lower winter-time fees before cutting services during a particularly slow few weeks.

"It's curious that Ryanair is restarting its flights just in time for the Christmas season," Szollar said. "This is not about Budapest Airport being expensive, but about Ryanair wanting to save money."

Ryanair said it would operate 14 per cent fewer flights from Stansted than during the previous winter season, when it withdrew four aircraft - its first such reduction following more than a decade of growth at the airport northeast of London.

Ryanair said it also was transferring some Stansted-based aircraft to new winter routes, chiefly to Spain's holiday islands and Costa del Sol as well as Katowice in southern Poland. While no Stansted routes are being eliminated, destinations facing reduced winter flights include Rome, Dublin, and Glasgow in Scotland.

O'Leary blamed BAA PLC, the company that operates all the major London airports, for forcing Ryanair's hand. He launched identical complaints Tuesday against the Dublin Airport Authority as he unveiled winter cutbacks at the airline's second-largest base.

In both cases, airport managers rejected a Ryanair proposal for them to lower their usual fees charged per passenger as the price for uninterrupted winter business.

"Monopoly airports ... have delivered high prices and awful facilities. It is time we allowed competition to deliver where monopolies have failed," O'Leary said.

BAA offered no immediate reaction to O'Leary's criticisms, but the Dublin Airport Authority dismissed them.

In a statement, the Dublin Airport Authority said O'Leary's demand for "anticompetitive support mechanisms" had been "justly declined." It said the operating expenses of international airports such as Dublin and Stansted were "not comparable to the remote former airfields to which Ryanair largely flies."

Ryanair shares were up 1.7 per cent at 2.98 euros, or US$4.73, in Thursday trading on the Irish Stock Exchange.