As from today, TAP operation between Lisbon and Cologne starts, with two daily flights.

Cologne thus joins Stuttgart – the operation started on June 10th – and Berlin, Düsseldorf, Frankfurt, Hamburg and Munich, in what represents a significant bet on the German market.

The operation to Cologne will be bi-daily and represents an increase of 14 weekly flights between Portugal and Germany. Stuttgart also has two daily flights from Lisbon. The operation to Frankfurt has already been reinforced by five flights and have a total of 26 flights per week. In total, TAP will operate, this summer, a total of 108 weekly frequencies between Lisbon and Germany, 33 more than in the same period of 2016.

With these reinforcements, TAP predicts an increase in the number of passengers carried to this country that can exceed 20% in 2017. The Airline also predicts to overcome the barrier of 1 million passengers in one year of operation.

On the Cologne route, TAP will operate two daily flights, with Embraer 190 or Embraer 195 aircraft, departing Lisbon at 12:35pm and 7:05pm and departing Cologne at 6:00am and 5:20pm. Between July 15th and September 25th, on Mondays, exceptionally, that flight usually scheduled to depart Lisbon at 7:05pm will depart at 8:00pm.

With regard to the Portugal Stopover programme, by the end of April this year it had already registered near 600 reservations with departure from German airports, from approximately 1000 passengers, especially from Munich, Frankfurt and Hamburg which together make 75% of all passengers coming from this country. With the addition of Cologne and Stuttgart to TAP’s map of destinations, as well as with the reinforcement of the Frankfurt operation and the growing global interest in the programme, a significant increase of these numbers is expected.