The calendar year 2019 has proven to be the busiest year on record at Ireland West Airport with passenger numbers climbing by almost five percent to 807,000 for the first time in the airport’s history, surpassing the previous record of 772,000 passengers achieved in 2018.
The passenger figures represent the fourth consecutive year of record passenger growth at the airport. The airport now serves 23 international destinations and is served by four of Europe’s major international airlines, Aer Lingus, Flybe, Lauda and Ryanair.
The number of passengers traveling on services to mainland and continental Europe hit a new high for the airport, increasing by 20 percent with the addition of a new service to Cologne by Ryanair and additional capacity on Ryanair’s Barcelona service helping boost the numbers travelling in 2019.
Despite the ongoing uncertainty over the Brexit situation, the growth in passenger numbers in 2019 was further fuelled by a very strong performance across the range of UK services available at the airport, with numbers travelling to and from the UK increasing by two percent in 2019. In addition, Ryanair recorded its busiest ever year for passenger numbers at Ireland West Airport carrying a total of 622,000 passengers last year.
This year has started positively as the airport is set to welcome a brand new airline to the airport as Austrian based airline, Lauda, a 100 percent-owned subsidiary of Ryanair Holdings plc will launch a new service to Palma Majorca from the airport starting on March 31, 2020 - their first ever service from regional Ireland.
The new Majorca service will operate twice weekly on Tuesdays and Fridays throughout the summer period using an Airbus A320 aircraft. Lauda is a low-cost carrier based in Vienna in Austria and currently flies to 38 destinations across Europe.
Holidaymakers from the West, North West and Midlands regions of Ireland can choose from a selection of twenty international destinations in 2020. Ryanair will operate flights to popular sun destinations such as Alicante, Barcelona, Faro-Algarve, Malaga and Milan (which will have a 30% increase in capacity for summer 2020. In addition, Paul Claffey Promotions will operate charter services for his popular music and sun tours.
For those who love a short city break Ryanair will once again operate twice weekly flights to beautiful Cologne in Germany as well as services to Bristol, East-Midlands, Liverpool (Ryanair will add 13,000 extra seats to their popular Liverpool service which will increase to six times weekly for summer 2020 ) and London services (Luton and Stansted ). Aer Lingus will fly daily to London Gatwick in 2020 whilst Flybe will operate services to Birmingham, Edinburgh and Manchester.
