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The aviation industry had been one of the worst-hit industries by the COVID-19 pandemic, but as countries around the world are slowly easing restrictions after witnessing improvement in the number of Coronavirus cases, some of the airlines are also working towards bringing the industry back on track.
One such is Lufthansa Airlines which has recently announced its long-haul flight schedule for June as it has decided to expand its services to 130 destinations including India from that very month, with approximately 1,800 weekly round trips from these countries.
“We look forward to the opening of borders and destinations starting in June,” the airlines mentioned on its official twitter handle.
The airlines has planned to restore services in India from Frankfurt to Mumbai. “I’m quite proud of our decision to have Mumbai as one of the first destinations for increasing our long-haul services. It reflects robust demand for flights to & from India, even in these unprecedented times,” George Ettiyil, Senior Director Sales, South Asia at Lufthansa Group, told ANI.
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The destinations in its first phase of resuming services include long-haul flights to Hong Kong, Toronto and Dubai among others. In the second half of June, it will expand to Prague, Majorca, Dublin, Manchester, Budapest and more. However, the airlines has mentioned that it’s tentative and is subject to changes based on travel guidelines of the arrival countries.
The expansion of services by Lufthansa, and its sister airlines — SWISS and Eurowings – has been to leisure destinations in order to accommodate the summer tourists season. As per reports, Harry Hohmeister, a member of the executive board of the company said that an essential part of revitalising aviation was to help people travel again, for both businesses as well as holiday purpose.
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“We are happy to announce that we will partially resume our flight operations as of June. Up to 190 flights will be operated from Zurich and Geneva and will be gradually increased over the weeks ahead,” SWISS International Airlines said in a tweet.
With SWISS resuming operations to several Mediterranean destinations and major European destinations such as Paris and Brussels, the number of flights next month is expected to increase four times as much as it is now. Moreover, Eurowings has also expressed its intention of adding services in line with the ‘travel bubble’ strategy being considered in many countries including flights to Spain, Portugal and Croatia.
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“With the gradual easing of travel restrictions, we are significantly expanding our flight schedule from June 2020 and will start flying you again to destinations including Mallorca, Croatia and Greece: ,” eurowin.gs/FlightScheduletweeted Eurowings.
The airlines has said that it will ensure all possible safety measures, including personal protective equipment for the cabin crew and the ground staff. It will also restrict the catering for passengers on board, to reduce contact. All the travellers will be required to wear a face mask from the security checkpoint until they disembark from the plane.
Related: #SomeGoodNews: International Airlines To Resume Limited Operations Across Select Destinations