A member of the Ryanair cabin crew looks out the window at Ryanair planes.
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LONDON – Ryanair expects this fiscal year to be “the toughest” in its 35-year history, the company said on Monday, as governments step up travel restrictions in an effort to contain new variants of Covid-19.
The budget airline is well on its way to a net loss of between € 850 million ($ 1.03 million) and € 950 million for its 2021 fiscal year, which will end in March. It reported a net loss of 306 million euros during the three months ending December.
“Covid-19 continues to wreak havoc across the industry,” Ryanair said in a statement. He added that Christmas and New Year traffic “was severely affected” by travel bans imposed on UK travelers in late December.
Several European governments decided to impose restrictions on flights departing the UK before Christmas following news that a new variant of the Covid-19 identified in the county was spreading rapidly. This contributed to an 83% drop in traffic during the month of December for Ryanair.
Now the EU needs to increase the slow pace of its launch program to match the UK’s performance.
The carrier “expects that Covid’s latest blocking and testing requirements before arrival will materially reduce flight schedules and traffic until Easter.”
In the new year, European governments expanded or introduced blockades as they faced a sharp rise in new infections. More recently, countries in the region have discouraged non-essential travel as they seek to reduce the number of daily cases. It is currently unclear when countries will begin to open their economies and come to encourage travel abroad.
However, European governments are vaccinating their populations in the hope that this will allow them to return to day-to-day life more quickly. However, the deployment of vaccines in Europe faces problems of production, supply and administrative procedures.
“We are pleased with the success of the UK vaccination program, which is expected to vaccinate almost 50% of the UK population (30 million) by the end of March. The EU now needs to step up the slow pace of its program deployment that coincides with the UK’s performance, ”Ryanair said on Monday.
Shares of Ryanair have fallen about 12% since the beginning of the year.