The news broke on Tuesday morning.
Ryanair has warned it plans to cut and close bases at airports as delays to Boeing’s B737 MAX aircraft are expected to affect growth rates.
Ryanair said it expects to cut its amount of B737 aircrafts to 30 for next summer, down from an anticpated 58.
The airline said this will reduce its summer 2020 growth rate from 7 percent to 3 percent.
The cuts and closures are expected to happen from November this year with underperforming bases at risk of closure or cutbacks.
Chief executive Michael O’Leary spoke about the news, saying: “For planning purposes, Ryanair will now revise its summer 2020 schedule based on 30 incremental aircraft, rather than 58. This will cut Ryanair’s summer 2020 growth rate from 7 percent to 3 percent, and means full year traffic growth for the year to March 2021 will be cut from 162m guests to approx. 157m.
“This shortfall in aircraft deliveries will necessitate some base cuts and closures for summer 2020, but also for the winter 2019 schedule. We are starting a series of discussions with our airports to determine which of Ryanair’s underperforming or loss-making bases should suffer these short term cuts and/or closures from November 2019.”
O’Leary also stated that Ryanair hopes to receive its first Max200 aircraft sometime between January and February 2020, and the amount they receive could rise, or fall further, depending on when the B737 MAX actually returns to flight services.
Ryanair has said it will continue to work with Boeing and EASA to recover these delivery delays during the winter of 2020, in an attempt to restore their growth to normal levels in summer 2021.
You can read O’Leary’s statement in full here.
