Ryanair marks belated opening of new Edinburgh base

Low-cost carrier Ryanair celebrated the delayed opening of its operations at Edinburgh airport on Thursday, with the Scottish capital becoming its 27th base.

Ryanair now has two new Boeing 737-800s, at a combined value of over £70 million, operating from Edinburgh on 23 routes to and from the Scottish airport.

Originally, the launch of the Edinburgh base was to be in September, but was pushed back when the strike at Boeing delayed the delivery of the new aircraft. The carrier is claiming that the opening of its new base will support 1,200 jobs.

One hundred workers will be employed directly by the carrier at the Edinburgh airport, and an additional 100 will be employed in airport services, such as catering and handling. The other 1,000 referred to will be in the hotel and tourism sectors.

Ryanair’s expansion of service is expected to bring more than 1.2 million additional passengers to Edinburgh annually, generating a visitor spend of £100 million.

Ryanair claims that the opening of the base confirms its commitment to Scotland, and also that with its strong cash reserves, it remains “one of the most financially secure airlines in Europe,” even as others collapse.

The head of sales and marketing for Europe for Ryanair, Lesley Kane, said: “The base launch will see 11 fantastic new routes on offer from Edinburgh Airport adding to the existing eight routes already in operation.”

Thanks to www.theherald.co.uk for the above quotes, for more information on this article please visit their website.

www.ryanair.com