Novedades de Ryanair

News Release

17.07.08

Ryanair Announces Temporary Closure of its Valencia Base

Ryanair, Europe’s leading low fares airline, today, 17^th July, announced the temporary closure of its Valencia base for the period from Tuesday, 4^th November until Friday, 19^th December. This closure will involve the grounding of Ryanair’s existing two aircraft at the airport and the cancellation of 504 flights. Ryanair estimates that its traffic at Valencia will be reduced by 80,000 passengers as a result of these cancellations.

Ryanair explained the decision to close its base at Valencia and cancel these flights at the airport for the following reasons;

- Ryanair has not received any support from local government or local tourism authorities in its efforts to provide a year round service at Valencia airport.

- Despite the fact that it is a largely undeveloped market which needs constant low fares, costs at the airport are among the most expensive in Spain and far outweigh the potential revenue which passengers are prepared to pay, particularly during the winter period.

- With oil at $140 a barrel, flights at expensive airports like Valencia must be reduced this winter when fares are very low.

Ryanair confirmed that it had written to AENA seeking a reduction on the costs of these flights this winter but this proposal has been rejected by the Spanish airport authority. The loss of this passenger traffic will now cost the airport authority significant commercial revenue and the region up to €8m in lost tourism revenue and the loss of 80 jobs.

Announcing this closure, Ryanair’s Director of In-flight and Human Resources, Eddie Wilson, said:

“We very much regret temporarily closing our base in Valencia during this November and December period. However, a combination of the complete lack of support from the local authorities and tourist bodies in Valencia, relatively high airport charges in the context of the market needs at Valencia and the massive increases which we face in fuel prices, makes it more profitable for Ryanair to ground these aircraft rather than fly them at Valencia during this period.

These flights and the 80,000 passengers would not be lost to Valencia or Spanish tourism if local government and AENA had responded to Ryanair’s proposals for support and discounts on these flights for the winter season.

Ryanair, with the lowest costs and lowest guaranteed fares in Europe, is the only airline capable of retaining year round tourism and business links for regional cities such as Valencia. However, low airport costs and local support are required to sustain these operations, particularly through the low yielding months in the winter. In the absence of this support, Ryanair has no alternative but to cancel these routes and develop its business elsewhere.

We will continue our discussions with the airport authorities in order to convince them that this type of interruption to our services need not happen in the future if costs are lowered and hopefully we can develop an agreement on how they can support the year round continuation of our services on a viable basis for the benefit of the airport and the region it serves.”