Cheap airline Ryanair is scrapping domestic flights from/to Athens to Rhodes and the airport of Chania, Crete. Although there is no official announcement by the airline so far, local media in Rhodes and Crete report of messages Ryanair has already sent to customers in the last couple of days. The scrapping of the two routes will be reportedly valid from June to October 2018, that is during Greece’s tourist season.
In messages to customers, Ryanair informed passengers who had booked flights from/to Athens-Chania of its decision via e-mail or mobile text messages. Ryanair mentioned “operational reasons,” for cancelling the flights.
The airline offers instead refund of the money or alternative routes from another airport nearby.
The citizens of Chania and the tourism sector have been appalled by the news, local media zarpanews.gr reports adding that alternative flights for June-July are already booked and the remaining options are expensive tickets.
Last flights offered on Athens-Chania route are until May 30th 2018.
Similar messages have been received also by passengers who have booked the Rhodes-Athens route, Rodiaki.gr report.
Local media describe the decision as a “bomb in the heart of tourist season.”
An official statement by Ryanair as to why it scraps the two domestic routes is expected on Thursday, rodiaki newspaper notes.
Some mean Greeks claim on social media, the reason for Ryanair to scrap the two domestic routes is the increased fees the new airports owner Fraport has raised.
Local media express concern that Ryanair will cancel more domestic routes.
International flights are not expected to be affected.
We have just checked that tickets for domestic flights from Athens to Mykonos, Santorini and Thessaloniki are available in June.
Check the UPDATE: Ryanair closes hub in Chania, cuts domestic and international flights, says the airline in a statement.
Quite likely that the increased fees have rendered the flights unprofitable. Better to return the customers’ money and not fly the route, rather than lose money on it. What else are they to do?
It’s not mean to point this out, it only makes sense.
pain in the ass for those travelling, yes.
More than domestic flights were cancelled. From Katowice operation suspend between 31st of May October 2018. Just got message from Ryanair.
Katowice?
Tuesday and Saturday flights ATH-WMI (Warsaw Modlin) also disappeared from the Ryanair booking system yesterday, for period of June to end of October. Not sure why. Maybe it’s because of RyanairSun, the new charter airline which is going to start this summer and fly to various Greek destinations (I have already seen RyanairSun flights to Chania, Kos posted on TUI) and they need more planes? So they’ve “nicked” them from somewhere else?