12 US airports have only one Europe route this summer, but had many more before; Aer Lingus has resumed Hartford

Some 43 US airports have non-stop Europe flights this summer, according to Cirium schedules information data. When each airport’s network is examined, they have a median of four Europe routes. With 37, it is perhaps surprising that New York JFK does not have the most – Newark does (39), as shown in the following figure. Newark is United’s transatlantic hub, serves Greater NYC and is crucial to Star Alliance. Chicago ORD is next (25), then Washington IAD (21). But what of US airports with only one European route?

12 US airports have one European route this summer

The 12, shown below in bullet points, include San Juan, Puerto Rico, a territory of the US and therefore considered domestic. Until very recently, New York SWF would also have made the list, but does not now. This is because the Faroe Islands’ Atlantic Airways is expected to operate a weekly A320neo service from Vagar, 4,890 kilometres away, between 22 August and 10 October.

The following figure shows how Europe seat capacity from these 12 airports has varied widely, with 2018 the peak, mainly because of Norwegian, WOW Air and British Airways. Yet several in the list below commenced since 2022. Note that stated frequencies are based on the week starting 1 August. While Europe non-stops play an important role for all 12 airports, they have a combined 52 weekly flights. That is just 1.3% of the entire US-Europe market.

• Anchorage: Condor from Frankfurt (3-weekly), Eurowings Discover from Frankfurt (2; began 13 June 2022)
• Cleveland: Aer Lingus from Dublin (4; starts 19 March 2023)
• Ft Myers: Eurowings Discover from Frankfurt (3; launched 28 March 2022)
• Fairbanks: Condor from Frankfurt (1; triangular with Anchorage)
• Hartford: Aer Lingus from Dublin (7; began 26 March 2023)
• Nashville: British Airways from London LHR (7)
• New Orleans: British Airways from London LHR (3)
• Oakland: Azores Airlines from Terceira (1)
• Pittsburgh: British Airways from London LHR (6)
• St Louis: Lufthansa from Frankfurt (3; launched 1 June 2022)
• San Jose: British Airways from London LHR (7)
• San Juan: Iberia from Madrid (5)

Aer Lingus restarts Hartford

Aer Lingus relaunched Dublin-Hartford on 26 March, with the 4,950-kilometre route served daily using the increasingly important A321LR. It originally commenced in October 2016 using wet leased 757-200s and later LRs and operated until March 2020. The route saw more than 272,000 two-way passengers carried in this time, most travelling to/from the UK and Germany.

Hartford is no stranger to Europe routes. The US DOT informs that Aer Lingus was one of three carriers to operate across the North Atlantic in the past 30 years. The first was Northwest to Amsterdam (2007/2008), followed by Aer Lingus (2016+). LCC Norwegian operated from Edinburgh using 737s (2017/2018).

10 of the 12 airports have had 28 other Europe routes

Examining Cirium data tells that 10 of the 12 airports have had other Europe routes since 2005, based on at least 10 flights. Some, like Cleveland and Pittsburgh, partly relate to hubs that have since closed, while others, like Anchorage, to inbound tourism.

Keflavik features more than most primarily because of the extreme expansion of WOW Air and/or Icelandair. The exception is Anchorage, served summer-seasonally by Icelandair between 2013 and 2019.

Note that the year shown below relates to the last year served. If more than one carrier has operated – some have had multiple – only the most recent is indicated. If two are shown, they both operated in the final year. If ‘until’ isn’t present, it only operated in the stated year.

• Anchorage: Keflavik (until 2019; Icelandair)
• Cleveland: Keflavik (2018; Icelandair/WOW Air), London LGW (until 2008; Continental), London LHR (2009; Continental), Paris CDG (2008; Continental)
• Fort Myers: Düsseldorf (until 2020; Eurowings), Munich (2018; Eurowings)
• Hartford: Amsterdam (until 2008; Northwest), Edinburgh (until 2018; Norwegian)
• New Orleans: Frankfurt (until 2019; Condor)
• Oakland: Amsterdam (until 2013; Arkefly, as then known), Barcelona (until 2019; Norwegian), Copenhagen (until 2019; Norwegian), London LGW (until 2019; Norwegian), Oslo (until 2019; Norwegian), Paris CDG (until 2019; Norwegian), Rome (until 2019; Norwegian), Stockholm (until 2019; Norwegian)
• Pittsburgh: Frankfurt (until 2019; Condor), Keflavik (until 2019; WOW Air), London LGW (until 2004; US Airways), Paris CDG (until 2018; Delta)
• St Louis: Keflavik (until 2019; WOW Air)
• San Jose: Frankfurt (until 2018; Lufthansa)
• San Juan: Frankfurt (until 2020; Condor), London LGW (until 2017; Norwegian), Oslo (until 2017; Norwegian), Stockholm (until 2017; Norwegian)

What about others?

While they no longer have Europe routes, Cirium confirms that these all had no more than one since 2005: Charleston (London LHR in 2019; British Airways), Indianapolis (Paris CDG until 2019; Delta), Kansas City (Keflavik until 2019; Icelandair); and Memphis(Amsterdam until 2012; Delta).