Ryanair has released details of a “limited schedule” for the coming days as it aims to “keep skies open” amid the coronavirus travel bans.
Michael O’Leary, group chief executive, said: “All of the team at Ryanair are working hard to provide repatriation and rescue flights for many EU governments.
“We are also offering our aircraft for emergency medical flights, including to/from China.
“Our pilots, engineers and other airline professionals will keep trying to assist EU governments where we can through this Covid-19 crisis.”
More than 90% of Ryanair’s aircraft will be grounded for the coming weeks but some “minimum flight links” are being kept open for emergency reasons, even though the passenger loads on these flights will be very low.
From March 27 to April 2, Ryanair will operate daily or weekly flights between the UK and Ireland (Dublin to/from Stansted, Gatwick, Birmingham, Bristol, Edinburgh, Glasgow and Manchester, and Cork-Stansted), plus Stansted to Eindhoven, Berlin, Berlin and Budapest.
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The carrier’s boss admitted the airline had cash to survive for “maybe even 12 months” even if there are
Aircraft are disinfected daily, with low loads social distancing will be optimised on-board.
“We ask all passengers to cooperate fully with our crews who are doing their best in difficult times to maintain vital links to/from Ireland and to/from the UK to facilitate our passengers and their families to deal with emergencies that may require urgent travel over the coming days and weeks,” said O’Leary.
“Ryanair apologises sincerely for the unprecedented grounding of our aircraft fleet and any schedule disruptions this may have caused, but we must all work together with EU governments to minimise the impact of Covid-19 on our citizens and our health services.
“As we all work to respond to the Covid-19 pandemic, let’s take care of ourselves, each other, our families, and our communities.”