Ireland’s flag carrier, Aer Lingus has announced this Monday (12) its schedule for the season of Summer 2023. According to the airline, it will include its largest-ever transatlantic network, as well as three new destinations in Europe connected to Dublin.

The new destinations will be Brindisi and Olbia in Italy and Kos in Greece, in what is a clearly leisure-focused schedule — air travel in Europe is largely more seasonal than elsewhere in the world.

In the transatlantic field, besides a number of capacity increases in already existing routes, Summer 2023 will see the return of flights to Hartford, Connecticut, and a new route connecting the Irish capital to Cleveland, Ohio, both of which had been already announced previously.

Other highlights of Aer Lingus’ plan for the next Summer season are increased frequencies in several leisure routes — in particular to Mediterranean destinations.

“Demand for European sun destinations is at an all-time high post-pandemic, with European sun high on everyone’s wish list”, stated the airline’s Chief Commercial Officer, Susanne Carberry, in a press release, “so Aer Lingus is delighted to announce increases across our European schedule to the most sought after, trendsetting European destinations this summer”.

Aer Lingus and its network

Owned by the International Airlines Group — the owner of British Airways, Iberia and Vueling –, Aer Lingus’ is based in a privileged geographical position. The network from its hub in Dublin is built to allow for quick connections between North America, Europe and vice-versa.

Its fleet is also designed for that; while it has the larger Airbus A330-200 and -300 widebodies, it also operates the A321LR, which allows for profitable operations to routes with less demand.

While the transatlantic hub has meant it survived competition with the other hometown carrier, Ryanair, and its aggressive approach, during the early 2000s Aer Lingus passed through extensive transformation which allowed for important cost reductions. While it still has higher costs than Ryanair, it can compete in short-haul to some extent.

That’s why, during Summer, it provides an extensive network that does not necessarily connect with the transatlantic flights, but is rather aimed at the Irish holiday public.

For Summer 2023, for instance, the airline will offer, for instance, 27 weekly frequencies between Dublin and Málaga, Spain, daily flights between Cork and Málaga and six weekly frequencies from Cork to Faro, Portugal, all important increases versus 2022.

And Aer Lingus does it all quite profitably; while they had lagged during COVID with the tougher restrictions in Ireland, in the third quarter of this year the airline posted an operating margin of 21% — higher than both British Airways and Iberia.