Colombian airline Avianca has signaled its intention to launch around two dozen international routes from five Latin American countries, adding new connections to the likes of Mexico City, New York and Quito.
The proposed network expansion comes just days after the Bogota-based carrier’s board approved the filing of its reorganization plan, a key part of its Chapter 11 restructuring process. Avianca said the strategy would help it to simplify operations and become the “most robust airline” in Latin America.
Thirteen of the 23 planned new routes are from destinations in Colombia, with a focus on increasing international links from regional airports such as Cali (CLO) and Medellín (MDE). Five services are expected to start from CLO, with a further six from MDE.
“Launching these 23 new routes shows that we wish to continue growing in a sustainable way, and that we have the firm purpose of continuing to be the airline with the most robust route network in our region,” CCO Manuel Ambriz said. “We know our customers want more destinations and more frequencies.”
From CLO, Avianca will begin flights to Cancun CUN), Mexico City (MEX), New York (JFK), Quito (UIO) and San José (SJO), while from MDE new routes are scheduled for Aruba (AUA), Guayaquil (GYE), MEX, Orlando (MCO), SJO and UIO.
Bucaramanga (BGA) will receive a new service to Miami (MIA), and Bogota (BOG) will be linked nonstop to Toronto (YYZ).
In Ecuador, the Star Alliance member plans to open routes from Guayaquil and Quito to both JFK and MIA. Costa Rica’s San José will also receive new service to JFK, Managua (MGA), MEX and Los Angeles (LAX).
Finally, Avianca intends to connect Guatemala City (GUA) with Washington Dulles (IAD), and San Salvador (SAL) with Orlando. The frequencies and start dates for each of the 23 new routes are yet to be confirmed.
According to data provided by OAG Schedules Analyser, Avianca is this week (w/c Aug. 9, 2021) flying to 62 destinations across its network, offering some 373,000 seats. During the same week in 2019, the airline served 75 points with about 722,000 seats.
Avianca has previously operated a number of the planned routes in the past, including San Salvador-Orlando, San José-Managua, San José-Mexico City and Medellin-Quito. However, the most recent of those to operate was SAL-MCO, which was discontinued in June 2019.
Avianca’s planned international route additions:
Photo credit: Joe Pries
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