Ryanair to cut capacity by 20% as bookings weaken

Ryanair said on Monday that it will cut flight capacity in September and October by 20% as bookings have taken a hit in the last 10 days due to Covid-19 restrictions.

The budget airline highlighted "continuing uncertainty over recent Covid case rates in some EU countries".

It said most of the cuts would be frequency reductions rather than route closures. They will be focused mainly on Spain, France and Sweden - where a rise in recent case rates has led to increased travel restrictions - and Ireland, which imposes 14 day quarantines on visitors from most other EU countries.

A spokesperson for Ryanair said: "Over the past two weeks as a number of EU countries have raised travel restrictions, forward bookings especially for business travel into September and October have been negatively affected, and it makes sense to reduce frequencies so that we tailor our capacity to demand over the next two months.

"Proper testing at airports, and effective tracing (as is being conducted in Germany and Italy) is the only realistic and proportionate method of supervising safe intra-EU air travel while effectively limiting the spread of the Covid-19 virus."

The news comes amid reports that Greece and Croatia will be next on the UK’s 14-day quarantine list, after last week’s addition of France, Malta and the Netherlands, among others.

Meanwhile, Germany has added Spain, excluding the Canary Islands, to its list of high-risk coronavirus areas.