The first Aer Lingus flight from Dublin to Cleveland took off on Friday afternoon with Airbus A321-253NX EI-LRA operating the EI-87 departing shortly after 4.00 pm on the inaugural service. The new four times per week service is the first new transatlantic service announced by Aer Lingus since 2019. With no direct flights between Europe and Ohio’s second largest city, the new route is also a new gateway between Europe and North America, continuing Aer Lingus’ highly focused strategy of growing its position as a transatlantic connecting carrier between Ireland, Europe, and North America.
This summer Aer Lingus’ transatlantic bookings are up more than 20% on 2019 and Cleveland flights are already off to a very strong start with more than 90% of seats booked across the peak summer season. Aer Lingus’ standout North American routes include Washington which is seeing a jump in bookings of 40% versus 2019 and now operates double daily from Dublin, along with Orlando, Florida with 35% more bookings which is largely resulting from increased demand from the UK and European passengers connecting via Dublin.
Since 2013 Aer Lingus has grown the number of transatlantic routes it serves from six to 19 in 2023 and the number of transatlantic passengers will have almost tripled in the same timeframe, from 1.1m in 2013 to an expected 3m in 2023. The airline’s long haul strategy is also focused on connecting Europe to North America and vice versa due to Ireland’s unique geographic position, along with the advantage of customers being able to clear US Customs and Immigration in Dublin and Shannon airports, removing the requirement to be cleared upon arrival stateside. Over the past decade, the total number of Aer Lingus transatlantic passengers connecting between Europe and North America, through our hubs, has increased almost threefold, from 300,000 to 800,000, and in 2022 more than half were travelling from North America. Today, close to 40% of transatlantic passengers connect via Dublin onwards. In 2022, the main connecting UK and European markets were Manchester, London, Paris, Edinburgh, and Amsterdam.
