Ryanair forced to cancel Edinburgh flights

[September 10th 2008]

Low cost airline Ryanair says it has been forced to cancel flights from Edinburgh airport because of the non-delivery of new planes from aircraft manufacturer Boeing.

Ryanair was to open its new base at Edinburgh airport on September 23rd but says it must now delay the opening until November 5th as Boeing is unable to deliver the new planes on time because of strike action by employees over a pay and benefits dispute.

“We sincerely regret the postponement of the opening of our Edinburgh base but unfortunately the two new aircraft, which we had reserved for this purpose, are now indefinitely delayed due to a strike by Boeing employees. However, due to increased aircraft availably in our fleet from early November we will be able to operate these exciting new Edinburgh routes from 5th November,” says Ryanair deputy chief executive, Michael Cawley.

The flights that have been cancelled until November 5th are from Edinburgh airport to Bournemouth, Malaga, Palma, Lodz, Krakow, Poznan, Bratislava, Schonefeld, Billund, Skavsta and Wroclaw.

“Passengers who were booked to travel on our new routes during this initial six week period will be refunded over the next seven days. We sincerely apologise to all our passengers for the inconvenience caused by this forced change to our schedule. However, we look forward to seeing our Edinburgh passengers on board our state of the art aircraft from 5th November,” Cawley adds.

Ryanair is going ahead with the launch of new flights from other airports. The low fares airline will start daily flights from East Midlands airport to Paris Beauvais airport on October 28th and from Liverpool John Lennon airport to the same destination on November 3rd.

Paris Beauvais airport is about 50 miles north of the centre of Paris. In May this year Ryanair started operating four flights a week from Paris Beauvais to Marignane airport near Marseille.

The budget airline has also confirmed it will launch twice weekly flights from Stansted airport to Agadir in Morocco next month with fares starting from £26.99 including taxes and charges.

Written by: Nick Purdom