Ryanair adds third new route to winter schedule at Stansted

Budget airline Ryanair is to add a third new route from Stansted to its 2015 winter schedule.

Ryanair will fly to and from Verona in Italy three times a week, joining new routes already announced to Castellon in Spain and Ponta Delgada in the Azores and bringing the airline’s total number of winter routes from Stansted to 111.

The Irish-based carrier will also operate additional flights on 24 other routes, including Berlin, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Madrid, Milan and Rome, with its winter schedule at Stansted totalling 1,032 flights a week.

It puts Ryanair on course to carry more than 18million passengers to and from Stansted over the next year, representing a 10% increase on its current total of around 16.4m.

Ryanair spokesman Robin Kiely said: “Ryanair is pleased to announce a new London Stansted route to and from Verona as part of our Winter 2015 schedule, with 111 London Stansted routes in total, which will help deliver over 18m customers per annuam at London Stansted Airport and support over 18,000 ‘on-site’ jobs.”

In total, Stansted handled nearly 21million passengers in the year to the end of March, representing annual growth of 16.3%.

: : Low-cost carrier easyJet today reported a 3.8% rise in passenger numbers for April to 6m, despite having to axe hundreds flights due to a French air traffic control strike.

Luton-based easyJet carried 66.2m passengers in the year to April, up 6.2% on the previous 12 months