Full Year Traffic Of 183.5m Unaffected As Yet
Ryanair, Europe’s No.1 airline, today (Thurs 28th Sept) announced a number of Winter 2023 schedule reductions as a direct result of Boeing aircraft delivery delays during the Sept to Dec period. Ryanair had expected to receive 27 aircraft between Sept and Dec, but due to production delays at the Spirit Fuselage facility in Wichita, combined with Boeings repair and delivery delays in Seattle, Ryanair now expects to receive only 14 aircraft between Oct and Dec. Ryanair is working with Boeing to try to accelerate deliveries in the Jan to May 2024 period so that it can enter the Summer 2024 peak travel season with all 57 new Boeing aircraft deliveries as expected.
As a result of these delivery delays, Ryanair will make a number of adjustments to its Winter 2023 schedule this week. We are reducing the number of Charleroi based aircraft by 3, Dublin based aircraft by 2, and will reduce 5 aircraft across 4 Italian bases, including Bergamo, Naples and Pisa. There will also be aircraft reductions in East Midlands, Porto, and Cologne.
Ryanair apologises for these unavoidable reductions in its Winter 2023 schedule. Ryanair has no spare aircraft this winter as scheduled maintenance is necessary across our full fleet of over 550 aircraft in order to have them all serviceable for its largest ever summer 2024 schedule.
Ryanair’s Michael O’Leary said:
“We are working closely with Boeing and their supplier, Spirit, to minimise these delivery delays. It is deeply regrettable that production problems in Wichita, and in Seattle, have yet again delayed Boeing’s contracted deliveries to Ryanair this winter. We are in regular dialogue with Boeing, and our primary objective is to ensure we get delivery of all 57 contracted B737 aircraft before the end of May 2024, so that Ryanair’s fleet can grow to over 600 aircraft for what will be our largest ever summer flight programme. These flight cancellations will take effect from the end of Oct, and will be communicated to all affected passengers by email over the coming days. Passengers will be offered reaccommodation on alternative flights or full refunds as they so wish. We apologise sincerely to passengers for any inconvenience caused by these delivery delays this winter.
At this early date, we do not expect these delivery delays will materially affect our full year traffic target of 183.5m, but if the delays worsen or extend further into the Jan to Mar 2024 period, we may have to revisit this figure and possibly adjust it slightly downward.”