Well IIRC HEL was axed because an aircraft was needed for an added frequency on the HAM route against Easyjet. I'd love to see LX back at HEL (when I took the route the flight was rather full on both segments).

stylo777 wrote:

I read somewhere that they plan to introduce a complete new premium eco seat, not the one LH/OS are currently using. The development of the seat of course takes time and I strongly believe it would go into the 77W planes first. Also don't forget that LX has and will maintain First in all longhaul aircraft. I don't expect PE before 2022.


I regards to Baltic countries, the demand is probably covered already by BT via RIX and via the LH Group hubs FRA and VIE. But ZRH-TLL would be a nice addition onboard A220 and a flight time of around 2:45. On the other hand, they would probably go to HEL first before adding TLL.

I would think that TLL could also be served by Air Baltic. They‘ve expanded quite a bit from TLL in recent months and now serve other business destinations such as Berlin, Brussels or Vienna.
All in all, the network out of ZRH to the Baltics and Poland certainly has some potential to be expanded. VNO was served as well a couple years ago by Germania. LH probably prefers to serve the Baltics and also the Polish cities with the exception of WAW with their multiple daily frequencies through MUC and FRA.

Btw, Thomas Klühr also mentioned in an interview that Swiss is considering axing LUG-ZRH flights once the new Monte Ceneri base tunnel is open and travel tome by train to Zurich will be 2 hours from Lugano. Of course, Ticino politicians are alarmed now as this would mean the end of scheduled services at Lugano airport.

Operationally, axing 4 daily LUG flights would open 4 more slots in Zurich to be used for other flights by LX/WK. I also wonder if LX really intends to keep ZRH-GVA at 8 daily frequencies in the future or if 4 flights perfectly times to their hub waces wouldn‘t suffice as well. Maybe somebody has some insights on this?

Thomas Klühr also mentioned in an interview that Swiss is considering axing LUG-ZRH flights once the new Monte Ceneri base tunnel is open and travel tome by train to Zurich will be 2 hours from Lugano. Of course, Ticino politicians are alarmed now as this would mean the end of scheduled services at Lugano airport.

The Gotthard base tunnel began construction in 1999 and opened in 2016. The Monte Ceneri base tunnel began construction in 2006. It has therefore been known 20 years prior to the 2nd tunnel opening that the Zurich-Lugano rail link would accelerate significantly. If the citizens of Ticino wanted Lugano airport to have passenger service long term, the airport management should have been persuading airlines to start routes 5 or more years ago; a couple of summer seasonal routes to small islands in the Mediterranean does not count !

Routes to London City, Paris, Rome, Amsterdam and Geneva might have proved viable long-term with sizeable airlines but with the closure of Darwin Air after its Etihad episode, it's far too late now. I imagine the only real hope is that Lugano turns into some sort of counterpart of St Gallen-Altenrhein airport, catering for niche wealthy pax paying high fares

stylo777 wrote:

I read somewhere that they plan to introduce a complete new premium eco seat, not the one LH/OS are currently using. The development of the seat of course takes time and I strongly believe it would go into the 77W planes first. Also don't forget that LX has and will maintain First in all longhaul aircraft. I don't expect PE before 2022.

Both the seat type, which will be new, and the aircraft/date the new product will debut on, have already been confirmed:

https://www.businesstraveller.com/busin ... nomy-seat/
(New seat)

https://swiss.newsmarket.com/english/pr ... c22406234d
(Press release, confirming entry date in spring 2021 and that it will be fitted on Boeing 777)

PhilInBRN wrote:

I also wonder if LX really intends to keep ZRH-GVA at 8 daily frequencies in the future or if 4 flights perfectly times to their hub waces wouldn‘t suffice as well. Maybe somebody has some insights on this?

I doubt LX would ever reduce frequencies. ZRH - GVA is 85% transfer traffic. Any reduction would affect their competitiveness in the market. LH/LX flies 8x to Frankfurt. BA 8x to LHR. AF 9x to CDG. In fact, they use to fly 10x a couple of years ago.

easyjet starting GVA-TIA on 28 November (3x weekly) and GVA-AGA (2x weekly) on 15 December.

GVA-WAW ended on 31 July.

TAP Air Portugal A339 is departing in a few minutes from Geneve. I think it’s the first time of this model in Switzerland

Duartelmatos wrote:

TAP Air Portugal A339 is departing in a few minutes from Geneve. I think it’s the first time of this model in Switzerland

Second. The first was F-WTTN operated by Airbus on a humanitarian charter.

YYZORD wrote:

So is LX not planning to add ICN and YYZ anymore after adding IAD and KIX?

LX never mentioned anything about YYZ, and ICN was a no-go since the only slots available were between midnight and 6am.

Idk if this is the proper place for this, but do we know any helvetic E2 routes? They're supposed to take their first in a few months and plan to have 4 by the end of the year. There are some articles but only in German.

They will initially be deployed on LX flights and only in 2020 also fly 2L routes. If you look at the current Helvetic fleet, you'll see that practically the whole fleet flies for LX (wetlease) and there are only about a dozen 2L flights per week.

The LX routes where you find the E190s most often are STR, LCY, NUE, MUC, MXP, BRU, FLR, TXL, BHX, MAD, FRA and many more. So I would guess that these routes are also the most likely to get the E2-190 initially. Except may be LCY with its steep-approach (additional training/certification needed) and small apron (E2 has an increased wingspan).

KE won't be upgrading its ICN-ZAG-ZRH to B789 this winter as previously announced, the A332 stays.

BERN - Skywork ceased flying in August 2018. Since then the only commercial passenger ops have been a few beach flights during S19
LUGANO - Adria has gone bust and Swiss appear disinterested - the Ceneri base tunnel will open next year, accelerating rail journeys to Zurich
SION - tiny with just a few ski flights per week in winter
ST GALLEN - has typically 2 flights per day to Vienna
LA CHAUX DE FONDS - is even quieter for passenger flights

Will any airline take airports outside Zurich, Geneva and Basel seriously in future and will these smaller airports see new service ? It looks like airport consolidation in Switzerland has reached its end game...

After JP went bust, LX will be introducing its own ZRH-LJU flights. To be operated daily from 16.10.

Blerg wrote:

After JP went bust, LX will be introducing its own ZRH-LJU flights. To be operated daily from 16.10.

What aircraft?

Can’t find any flights released?

Someone83 wrote:

Blerg wrote:

After JP went bust, LX will be introducing its own ZRH-LJU flights. To be operated daily from 16.10.

What aircraft?

Can’t find any flights released?

Flights are in the system, I think first two weeks it's E90 operated by Helvetic after which it gets switched to the C-series. I was looking at flights yesterday and LJU-ZRH is already being sold via lh.com

Someone83 wrote:

Blerg wrote:

After JP went bust, LX will be introducing its own ZRH-LJU flights. To be operated daily from 16.10.

What aircraft?

Can’t find any flights released?

The Press release says it'll be operated by wetleased Helvetic Aircraft to start off with, though there's no exact timetable or Aircraft listed. It also won't be daily until the 27th, after which some flights will be Helvetic operated, and some LX.

https://swiss.newsmarket.com/english/pr ... bb9302e104

Bhoy wrote:

Someone83 wrote:

Blerg wrote:

After JP went bust, LX will be introducing its own ZRH-LJU flights. To be operated daily from 16.10.

What aircraft?

Can’t find any flights released?

The Press release says it'll be operated by wetleased Helvetic Aircraft to start off with, though there's no exact timetable or Aircraft listed. It also won't be daily until the 27th, after which some flights will be Helvetic operated, and some LX.

https://swiss.newsmarket.com/english/pr ... bb9302e104

This is the schedule:

ZRH-LJU 12.35-14.00
LJU-ZRH 14.50-16.05

Does anyone have any updates on the EIS of the Swiss a320neos? The LH group fleet site is now showing 2020, this seems to have been pushed back from the original date of late 2019.

Sent from my SM-G973F using Tapatalk

In the aftermath of JP's departure from LUG, LX has started cooperating with SBB, the national railway company, to ensure its presence in LUG by transporting passengers between Lugano and ZRH by train, a model very similar to the current BSL-ZRH train connection. The train ticket is included in the price.

The advantage of this new service is that LX keeps its presence in LUG and that there are up to 14 daily connections to ZRH instead of the 4 daily flights. However, journey times will be longer, and it is not a nonstop train ride, as you have to change trains at Zurich main station, which could be bothersome when traveling with lots of luggage, even though it is a great train station to connect.

More information in the official press release: https://swiss.newsmarket.com/english/pr ... 01c919b7e7

According to the Facebook page of the Swiss embassy in Senegal, Air Senegal has confirmed the opening of a Geneva - Dakar route in 2020. This will be the 4th sub-Saharan African route to open in 4 years, following Air Mauritius, Ethiopian Airlines and Kenya Airways. On top of that, elsewhere in Africa, of Geneva is served by Egyptair, Air Algeria and Royal Air Maroc. Africa together with the well established Middle Eastern routes, are becoming a key features of GVA route footprint ( with El Al, MEA, Royal Jordanian, Azerbaijan Airlines, Saudia, Etihad Airways, Qatar Airways, Emirates Airlines, Kuwait Airways). There was some press coverage about Gulf Air returning in 2020, but this is unlikely due to the situation ine the Gulf, same (and more acutely) for Qeshm Air to Tehran.

On the other hands, no new North American services since 2009 with the arrival of UA and AC. And nothing in sight in Asia since CA in 2013. CX was rumoured for 2020, but no more given the situation. The Chinese ambassador in Switzerland mentioned last year to be working on a GVA - PVG, probably a matter of when, not if.

What market is there between Geneva and Senegal? Does this route stand a chance at all?

According to well informed source on a French Swiss forum, 40 pdew. And 4th market in Europe in terms of revenues after Paris, Milan and Brussels. Dakar is the main centre of UN activities in West Africa, and the flight should catch a large senegalese community in its French catchment area (Lyon is 150km away).

https://www.routesonline.com/news/38/ai ... ce-in-w19/

Korean Air's ICN-ZAG-ZRH might turn into a summer seasonal service.

Tomorrow's also Air China's last flight to Zurich. Not sure when/if CA is back to ZRH, but long-term the ZRH-PEK route warrants two carriers.

YangFeng wrote:

https://www.routesonline.com/news/38/airlineroute/286818/korean-air-suspends-zagreb-zurich-service-in-w19/

Korean Air's ICN-ZAG-ZRH might turn into a summer seasonal service.

Tomorrow's also Air China's last flight to Zurich. Not sure when/if CA is back to ZRH, but long-term the ZRH-PEK route warrants two carriers.

KE already confirmed ZAG is going summer seasonal so I suppose same applies for ZRH.

The airline stated: “We have made the decision considering the trend of travel demand, which increased in the summer season and decreased in the winter. We have not yet decided whether suspending the flights during the winter season would be continued in the future”. Korean Air plans to resume the service in summer 2020.

YangFeng wrote:

The airline stated: “We have made the decision considering the trend of travel demand, which increased in the summer season and decreased in the winter. We have not yet decided whether suspending the flights during the winter season would be continued in the future”. Korean Air plans to resume the service in summer 2020.

Exactly, for this winter they are suspending flights but they don't know for next one. If this route relies on ZAG then we can can most definitely assume it won't be coming back next winter either, ZAG is dead in winter and so far this year it barely grew in term of passenger numbers.

https://www.exyuaviation.com/2019/10/ko ... inter.html

Cyprus Airways will be returning to Geneva with a one weekly flight every Friday. Flights resume on 29.05.2020.

CY352 LCA1330 – 1640GVA 319 5
CY353 GVA1730 – 2210LCA 319 5

https://www.routesonline.com/news/38/ai ... es-in-s20/

Are there any further expansions with Edelweiss expected for 2020? They have grown quite fast over the recent years, and I still see some room for more.

Engine troubles again with PW and the A220.
HB-JCC operating flight LX359 LHR to GVA diverted this morning to CDG after one engine shut-down during climb.
That's the 3rd engine issue within 3 months. Wondering if other operators are suffering the same problems?

Source in German:
https://www.aerotelegraph.com/swiss-kae ... -beim-a220

According to swiss newspaper Blick, some or all Swiss A220 are currently grounded. To be confirmed.

Edit: link in french: https://www.rts.ch/info/economie/107871 ... ision.html

All 29 aircrat are grounded, awaiting revision. That is 30% of Swiss fleet and 50% of their short haul fleet! Huge problem coming!

Yesterday Swiss inaugurated ZRH-LJU. Initial plan was for Helvetic to operate for two weeks after which LX would dispatch the C-series. Looking in the system I see this was revised and Helvetic will remain. I wonder if this has to do with softer bookings than initially anticipated? LH Group was quite slow to respond to JP's demise.

https://www.exyuaviation.com/2019/10/tr ... ljana.html

Edelweiss Air will launch 2 new routes in Summer 2020:
- Zurich to Menorca - starts 17 May 2020 - 1x weekly
- Zurich to Agadir - starts 13 September 2020 - 1x weekly

The airline will also increase the frequencies of 9 routes:
- Las Palmas
- Tenerife
- Marsa Alam
- Ibiza
- Edinburgh
- Heraklion
- Mykonos
- Kos
- Larnaca

Edelweiss Air will discontinue its summer-seasonal Zurich-Inverness route

https://www.flyedelweiss.com/EN/media/P ... tions.aspx

According https://www.lh-taufnamen.de/swiss SWISS will use HB-JD* for the 320NEO's and HB-JP* for the 321NEO's.

People's (Viennaline) to reduce fleet from 2 to 1 and cut jobs. Summer destinations in the Med will not be repeated in 2020. The airline will limit itself to flying just their core St Gallen / Altenrhein - Vienna route

Forget about any new destinations from Altenrhein for a while...

OA940 wrote:

Idk if this is the proper place for this, but do we know any helvetic E2 routes? They're supposed to take their first in a few months and plan to have 4 by the end of the year. There are some articles but only in German.

Helvetic's first E2, HB-AZA, was presented in Zurich today. No mention of when it's starting scheduled service, or where to, though.

https://twitter.com/zrh_airport/status/ ... 34341?s=20

HB-AZA is supposed to have it's first commercial flight already tomorrow morning (Nov 1) as LX850 to Bremen.

This January LX will be discontinuing its ZRH-INI. This route was doomed the moment JU launched a subsidized flight to FDH.

That said, seems like LX is taking the fight to BEG which will be increased from 12 to 19 from the first day of summer and then to 21.

Funded by the BRN airport as well as crowdfunding, a new airline breathes a bit of new life into Berne's struggling airport.

With an Embraer 190 and a Dash 8, "FlyBair" plans to offer flights beginning in May 2020 to tourism destinations like Rhodes. From autumn 2020, they want to connect Berne to a hub like London, Amsterdam or Munich.

FlyBair will contract will Lions Air to carry out the flights. Lions Air, in turn, leases the two aircraft upon demand - the smaller one will operate during winter time, the larger in the summer.

A news article says that for CHF 250, you'll get to be a shareholder. For donating 500'000, you'll get to name their terminal...

The obvious problem is that Berne is already serving quite a few Mediterranean/Red Sea destinations during the summer, through charter airlines. And you can still board a train in Bern's main station, and check in with BSL's easyJet one hour and 20 minutes later...

More details can be found on their website https://flybair.ch (in German). You can also see the planned destinations and the current status of their crowdfunding with which they try go raise 1 million CHF (~ 1M USD). Currently they got 160'000. The airplanes will be leased from German Airways.

I guess this being a "virtual" airline with all operations contracted out, it will allow them to start with very little capital, but I'm still far from convinced that they will ever take off.

When an airport has to contribute money to the startup costs of an airline to provide flights to/from said airport, the airline is usually not profitable. The business case for Bern airport is weak given the close proximity of the much better served Basel and Zurich airports. The business case for a new Bern Airways is also uncertain

davidjohnson6 wrote:

When an airport has to contribute money to the startup costs of an airline to provide flights to/from said airport, the airline is usually not profitable. The business case for Bern airport is weak given the close proximity of the much better served Basel and Zurich airports. The business case for a new Bern Airways is also uncertain

totally agree, I thought the same when reading about the "start-up phase".
it's sad, but with airlines going for much bigger equipment (e.g. OS replaces DH8's with 320...), I don't see any chance for BRN in short- and mid-term.
the airports "door to the world" was the MUC flight by LH Regional; the smallest they nowadays could send is the CR9 with 90 seats. based on this example, commercially viable would be a scenario with two return flights - one in the morning, one in the evening. taking the calculation further, this sums up to around 1.000 seats oneway and on a 6x weekly pattern.
I have great doubts that any airline is able to find even 800-900 passengers every week; competition is simply too close and definitely too strong (BSL/U2, ZRH/LX and others). as others already said, in 1:20 hrs. you board an Intercity train at Bern and get off right underneath the check-in hall in ZRH. A bit more complicated to BSL with a change from train to bus, but the cost-concious traveller couldn't care less, because time-wise it's the same (1:15 hrs.).

Seems like LX is now continuing the A340 retrofitting program for the last two ones.
HB-JMA is now at HKG since 30 Oct. Wonder if they will finish in 2019.

Theotime74 wrote:

Seems like LX is now continuing the A340 retrofitting program for the last two ones.
HB-JMA is now at HKG since 30 Oct. Wonder if they will finish in 2019.

interesting that they went to HKG (probably HAECO) instead of DRS (EFW) where the initial three frames have been retrofitted.
I don't think that they will be able to finish in 2019, but surely in very early 2020 since it took 5-6 weeks for each frame so far.
those five will cover flights to BOS, EWR, JNB, KIX (new) and PVG; good for the customer to experience a consistent hard-product.

stylo777 wrote:

Theotime74 wrote:

Seems like LX is now continuing the A340 retrofitting program for the last two ones.
HB-JMA is now at HKG since 30 Oct. Wonder if they will finish in 2019.

interesting that they went to HKG (probably HAECO) instead of DRS (EFW) where the initial three frames have been retrofitted.
I don't think that they will be able to finish in 2019, but surely in very early 2020 since it took 5-6 weeks for each frame so far.
those five will cover flights to BOS, EWR, JNB, KIX (new) and PVG; good for the customer to experience a consistent hard-product.

From what I heard, Dresden is now busy retrofitting QF A380.

AFAIK EFW in DRS had no slots available, hence HAECO is contracted for the remaining 2 frames. -JMA should return to ops early DEC19.


Also, HB-IPV is expected to phase out in mid Jan2020.

After cutting INI last week, Swiss is now dropping summer seasonal flights to Zagreb (3 weekly) and Sarajevo (2 weekly). This leaves Sarajevo without an air link with Switzerland which I find odd given how large their diaspora is over there.

Seems like only BEG is working for them which is being increased to 21 weekly next summer. We still have to see how the newly launched LJU performs.

Some parts (3) were found in the suspected area where the LX A220 had the IFSD. They still miss a 70cm piece of the fan.

Source in German: https://m.20min.ch/schweiz/news/story/teile-des-triebwerks-der-swiss-a220-gefunden-13856619

HB-JMA (A343) is now on maintenance in HKG. Does this also mean its reconfiguration or they are only fitted in DRS?