Air Berlin’s demise has led to a seat shortage on domestic routes within Germany.
One publication, English-language thelocal.de, reported that flights on one domestic route were far more expensive following Air Berlin’s bankruptcy.
In a statement released yesterday (November 29) Lufthansa says it will be adding an extra 700,000 seats over the winter period to meet the seat shortfall.
Lufthansa had previously announced it would be deploying a large B747-400 to operate a number of services on the main Berlin-Frankfurt feeder route during November.
The airline does not normally fly long-haul from Berlin, although it is currently operating Air Berlin replacement flights to New York until the start of the 2018 summer schedule, when budget subsidiary Eurowings will take over the route.
Lufthansa now says the B747 will also be deployed on the Berlin-Frankfurt route during December, after which Lufthansa will operate all flights on this route wherever possible with 200-seater A321s.
The Lufthansa Group will also be operating extra flights on longer routes such as Munich to Berlin, Hamburg, Cologne and Dusseldorf and on key feeder services from Frankfurt to Berlin and Dusseldorf.
All told, Lufthansa says these additional flights will replace 45 per cent of the previous capacity offered by Air Berlin.
