Air NZ increases flights to Adelaide as demand improves

By NZPA

Tuesday 20th March 2007

Air New Zealand said today it was increasing flights to and from Adelaide due to strong demand.

It is upping its service between Auckland and Adelaide in October to five a week from three.

The airline's short haul manager Norm Thompson said Adelaide bookings had been consistently strong since the service was launched a year ago.

Travel growth both ways had been strong. Larger planes would be used during the coming Easter school holidays period.

The airline said its overall loadings were up 2.3% to 79.0% in February.

The higher load factor was achieved despite the 40.5% increase in capacity to Asia/UK following the launch of new services to Shanghai and the second daily London service via Hong Kong.

That increase was partially offset by capacity reductions of 15.4% on North America/UK, due to the change from a Boeing 747 to a 777 aircraft on London via Los Angeles services.

However, growing demand has meant that a 747 will be re-introduced to these services from June this year.

Tasman/Pacific Island capacity decreased 6.9% due to changing from wide to narrow-bodied aircraft.

These changes saw load factors improve 9.4% to 77.4%.

Domestic traffic growth of 4.1% outperformed capacity growth of 2.6%, leading to a 1.1% increase in domestic passenger load factor to 78.3%.

The year-to-date group load factor of 75.9% was 1.0% lower than last year but that drop had been more than compensated for by a 10.6% increase in yield.

From December 6, 2007 to March 26, 2008, Air NZ will operate an additional weekly service from Auckland to Rarotonga and on to Los Angeles, doubling flights from the United States via the Cook Islands.

Air NZ shares were up 1 cent to $2.04 in a weak market today.

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