Aer Lingus monitoring Heathrow as BA pauses short-haul ticket sales

Aer Lingus is monitoring the situation at Heathrow airport after British Airways halted ticket sales on short-haul flights from the London hub until mid-August.

Heathrow, used by many Irish people travelling to Britain or connecting to destinations not served from here, recently capped passenger numbers there at 100,000 a day to avoid delays and missed flights.

Aer Lingus said it planned to operate all flights as scheduled to Heathrow this week. The carrier is continuing to monitor the situation at the airport as Heathrow continues to struggle with bottlenecks that have hit summer travel.

British Airways on Monday said it would stop selling short-haul flights from Heathrow until August 8th, but yesterday extended that to the middle of the month at least. Aer Lingus is not considering taking the same step at this point, it is understood.

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International Airlines Group, owner of both Aer Lingus and British Airways, last week said it faced a “challenging environment” at Heathrow, a key base for its UK airline.

Heathrow introduced the 100,000-a-day cap last month as it claimed that problems with delays, missed flights and mislaid baggage worsened when passenger numbers topped this level.

The move led to Aer Lingus cancelling some flights to and from the London airport, which is an important part of its short-haul business.

Heathrow is one of several European hubs wrong-footed by a post-Covid surge in air travel and labour shortages. Amsterdam Schiphol has also capped passengers.

The Netherlands airport will continue its 67,500 limit through September and introduce a 69,500 cap in October, indicating that it believes current problems will last beyond the summer holiday season.

Bottlenecks were widely expected to ease in September once peak summer travel had passed.

According to some calculations, about 40 per cent of flights from both Heathrow and Schiphol have been delayed this summer.