Ryanair raises summer capacity from five UK airports

Ryanair is raising capacity from five UK airports this summer by deploying extra aircraft.

The budget airline has announced a new route from Luton to Wroclaw, and four from Stansted: Forli, Glasgow, Malmö and Parma.

Extra frequencies have been added on 50+ other routes from London airports including Alicante, Barcelona, Faro, Lisbon, Madrid, Malaga and Malta.

Ryanair will base one new aircraft at Stansted for this summer, bringing its total London-based fleet to 57 aircraft.

Meanwhile, a 19th Boeing 737 will be based at Manchester Airport to provide 540,000 additional seats and enable the introduction of new routes to Castellon in Spain and Rimini in Italy.

The no-frills carrier has also raised frequencies on 37 routes, including Faro, Porto and Rhodes, as well as city break destinations such as Barcelona, Dubrovnik and Milan.

Total capacity is up by 9% year on year to 6.6 million seats with annual passenger numbers projected to grow to nine million.

Birmingham Airport is gaining a ninth aircraft for the summer with new routes added to Agadir, Rome Fiumicino, Marrakesh, Tirana and Warsaw Modlin as capacity grows by 424,000 seats or 17% to three million as frequency is increased to 18 existing destinations including Alicante, Barcelona, Malta, Paris, Porto and Valencia.

A third aircraft is being based at Newcastle Airport – where rival easyJet has just opened a base –to provide 210,000 additional seats. The 27% annual growth of one million seats includes new routes to Brussels Charleroi, Budapest, Malta and Marrakesh, expanding the network to 22 destinations.

Frequencies are increased on another seven routes, including Barcelona, Dublin, Faro, Krakov, Malaga and Milan.