LONDON – On April 8, the United Kingdom-based low-cost leisure airline Jet2 announced that it will be substantially expanding its summer 2023 season offering from three of its UK bases.
The Routes
This new announcement is primarily directed at service increases and some new destinations from their Glasgow, East Midlands, and Bristol bases.
In terms of new destinations, Jet2 will add from Glasgow new services to Girona, which is just north-east of Barcelona in Spain.
East Midlands will see Santorini services to the island in Greece and Bristol will see service to Malaga in Southern Spain as well as new services to Chania on the Greek island of Crete.
With the addition of these new services, it will mean that from East Midlands and Bristol, passengers will have a choice of up to 32 destinations for the summer vacation options across both airports, and in Glasgow, passengers will have up to 28 different destinations to choose from.
This will be welcome news for many passengers that utilize those three airports.
Not only this, but passengers across Jet2’s entire network will, by the summer 2023 season, have access to up to 52 different summer destination choices across many European countries including Turkey as well.
The airline’s other seven main bases across the UK are Manchester, Birmingham, Leeds, London Stansted, Newcastle, Edinburgh, and Belfast in Northern Ireland.
Are There Any Upsides?
Commenting on this announcement, Jet2’s Chief Executive Officer, Steve Heapy said, “We always knew that when international travel returned to normal, customers and independent travel agents would respond by flocking to book our award-winning flights and holidays.”
“Such an expansion would not be possible without customers choosing to travel with us in huge numbers, so I would like to sincerely thank our customers and independent travel agent partners for their continued support.”
“I can promise them that our unwavering focus will continue to be on delivering the VIP customer service that had made such a swift and significant impact.”
As mentioned by Heapy, this major expansion shows great signs that the UK travel sector is returning to normal growth rates, and we’ll start to see the sector begin to ramp up services in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The aircraft type could be varied for these services as at present Jet2 operates over 80 Boeing 737-800NGs (Next Generation), eight Boeing 757-200’s and has recently acquired three Airbus A321ceo (Current Engine Option).
However, 2023 for Jet2 will be the start of a new era as they are due to begin taking on their recently ordered 51 firm Airbus A321neo and they also have options for up to a further 75 additional aircraft.
The 51-based figure comes following news that the carrier has exercised 15 of its options, bringing forward further fleet expansion going forward.
One major thing that is worth noting is the recent delays that many passengers are experiencing across multiple major UK airports, and it is likely to affect many flights with passengers potentially missing their flight or the flights even being canceled entirely due to lack of ground, check-in and security staff.
