SriLankan Airlines could begin flying from London Gatwick airport before the end of 2012 as the carrier looks to add services from the UK.
The Sri Lankan carrier is also considering services from Manchester as it upgrades its fleet. Sri Lankan currently flies twice daily from Heathrow to Colombo, with services on to the Maldives.
Chairman Nishantha Wickremasinghe told Travel Weekly: “We have our slots at Heathrow, but we would like to grow at Gatwick and maybe at Manchester.
“We are looking seriously at Gatwick, possibly to start next year. It is a big market for leisure travel to the Maldives.”
SriLankan flies four or five times a week from Paris, Frankfurt, Rome, Milan and Zurich. Wickremasinghe said: “We aim to go daily from all of them, but the UK is more important than any other European destination.”
However, he said the level of Air Passenger Duty (APD) on UK departures was a concern. “We hope the authorities will make the UK more attractive to airlines,” he said. “Heathrow is one of the most expensive destinations in the world and people are very price conscious. You may suddenly find people go out of the market.”
The carrier is re-fitting its narrow-body fleet and will have four new Airbus A320s in service by next March. It aims to have new wide-body aircraft in operation by 2013-14, but in the meantime has brought in two aircraft under five-years old and hopes to acquire another two.
Wickremasinghe said: “We are accelerating a re-fit programme and will add new destinations once the fleet is in place. We have to compete with the giants in the Middle East – Emirates, Etihad and Qatar Airways. We need new or nearly new aircraft with good product. You can’t have the product of five years ago.”