SriLankan Airlines is to resume flights between Colombo and Zurich this winter, a route it has not served for the past six years. The carrier originally launched flights on the route in 1980 on a four times weekly basis but suspended its services in 2005. The new link will be introduced on December 23 and will be operated on a twice weekly basis by a two-class Airbus A330-200. The Colombo link will operate alongside flights to Malé in the Maldives, with one of the flights routing directly to Colombo and then on to Malé, the other flying via the Maldives archipelago.
The airline will face competition from Edelweiss Air, the leisure subsidiary of Swiss International Air Lines, which currently offers twice weekly flights to both Colombo and Malé. An estimated 35,000 O&D passengers flew between Zurich and Colombo in the past year and 38,000 between Zurich and Malé. The majority of these are flying via Dubai on the services of Emirates Airline, who up until recently had been managing the development of the Sri Lankan carrier.
Edelweiss is mainly targeting the charter market, while SriLankan expects to secure demand from both the business and leisure sectors. Both Sri Lanka and the Maldives are very popular destinations with Swiss tourists and there is also a large Sri Lankan community in Switzerland.
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NETWORK ANALYSIS: SRILANKAN AIRLINES IN EUROPE (weekly flights) |
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|
Origin |
Destination |
Weekly Flights |
Weekly Seats |
|
Colombo |
Frankfurt |
4 |
1,207 |
|
London Heathrow |
9 |
2,898 |
|
|
Milan Malpensa* |
3 |
912 |
|
|
Paris CDG |
3 |
966 |
|
|
Rome Fiumicino ** |
3 |
912 |
|
|
Malé |
London Heathrow |
4 |
1,288 |
NOTE: * via Rome Fiumicino on outbound leg; ** via Milan Malpensa on inbound leg
As the table above illustrates, SriLankan Airlines already offers flights to five destinations in Europe with direct flights between Colombo and Frankfurt, London Heathrow, Paris CDG, Rome Fiumicino and between Malé and London Heathrow. Flights to Milan Malpensa are also offered via Rome on the inbound leg from Sri Lanka and direct to Colombo. Later this year, the airline will inaugurate flights to Moscow Domodedovo via Dubai (from September), while additional frequencies are expected to Frankfurt, Milan Malpensa and Paris CDG (from November).
In the past year around 842,000 and 721,000 O&D passengers travelled on scheduled services from Europe to Sri Lanka and the Maldives, respectively. SriLankan Airlines accounted for an estimated 37.4 per cent and 8.3 per cent of this traffic.
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