*****UPDATE: Today Eurowings officially announced its new Stockholm base. Its operation there will be larger than originally thought. Eurowings will base five A320s at Stockholm and will serve 20 destinations starting from March 27 next year.
The initial destinations are as noted in our report. Eurowings says further destinations will be announced in the coming weeks.*****
Over the past few days most media has been preoccupied with Easyjet and Wizz Air.
What is happening under the radar, so to speak, is Eurowings’ expansion both in mainland Europe and Scandinavia.
Eurowings, the budget subsidiary of the Lufthansa Group, is set to open a new Prague base at the end of October.
Commenting on the news, Eurowings CEO Jens Bischof said:
“Eurowings will offer non-stop connections to Czech business travellers and vacationers alike – just in time for the relaunch of air traffic after the long-time Corona crisis.”
Jakub Puchalsky, a member of the Prague Airport Board of Directors, added:
“Prague will become the home base of another European carrier… From the end of October 2021, the German carrier Eurowings will expand the offer of direct flights from Prague to several European cities, including Barcelona, Milan, Athens, Stockholm, Copenhagen, Tel Aviv and Birmingham. The airline will thus contribute to the resumption of traffic and offer connections to popular holiday retreats, such as the Canary and the Balearic Islands.”
Further routes (yet to be determined) will launch in 2022.
Another base, this time in Stockholm, is tipped to open next year. Flight details were posted on the Eurowings website yesterday (presumably in error) and have since been taken down, presumably pending an official announcement.
The Stockholm base is expected to open in time for the summer 2022 timetable with flights to 12 cities: Alicante, Barcelona, Berlin, Birmingham, Copenhagen, Faro, Gdansk, Pristina, Rome (FCO), Malaga, Nice and Palma.
With this new base, one wonders whether Eurowings will be taking over some routes which might have been operated by SAS. Both SAS and the Lufthansa Group are Star Alliance members and both co-operate.
This expansion away from Germany is significant because Eurowings acts mainly as the airline linking Germany’s cities, Frankfurt and Munich excepted, to the rest of Europe.
I would add that further changes are possible and that Eurowings has a habit of showing both non-stop and indirect flights on its booking pages. The information above refers to non-stop flights only.
