Aer Arann is considering developing a scheduled transatlantic service out of Cork to New York and Boston over the coming 18 months, but has ruled out introducing it in the immediate future, according to the airline's managing director.
Padraig Ó Ceidigh told a press briefing in Cork yesterday he believes there is huge potential for such a service but that it would cost about €30 million to launch. He said the company would need a major investor to come on board.
He had favoured launching such a service in the past 18 months but his board had been more cautious. However, it was a venture the company plans to revisit over the next 18 months.
"We finally decided that it was probably too big an investment for us to proceed with alone - it would probably take four aircraft to operate the service all year round," said Mr Ó Ceidigh.
The service would operate on a scheduled basis with four to five flights a week during the summer months of June, July and August, reducing to three flights a week throughout the rest of the year. He said the company plans to increase its flights per week out of Cork airport from 171 to 202 from May 9th.
He also revealed that Aer Arann had carried just under 100,000 passengers to and from Cork airport for the first quarter of 2005, which represented an 8 per cent increase on the previous year.
Cork Chamber of Commerce president Robin O'Sullivan expressed satisfaction after an earlier meeting with Mr Ó Ceidigh regarding the number of cancellations of Aer Arann flights to Dublin. The chamber had earlier expressed concern that 23 of the 362 Aer Arann flights out of Cork in March were affected.