Low-cost competition at Stockholm Arlanda (ARN) is set to further intensify this summer after Norwegian confirmed plans to reopen a base at the Swedish airport.
The restructured LCC intends to offer a network of 54 nonstop routes from Arlanda to destinations across Europe—only seven of which will be without any direct competition.
In preparation for the base opening, the airline has started the recruitment of around 270 cabin crew who will be stationed at Arlanda from April.
The Norwegian base will be the fourth to open at the Stockholm airport since last autumn. Finnair and Ryanair have already stationed aircraft at the airport, while Eurowings will open a base there in March.
During the summer 2022 season, data provided by OAG Schedules Analyser shows that there will be 3.3 million low-cost departure seats from Arlanda, compared with 3 million during summer 2019. Mainline capacity is also scheduled to increase from 7.4 to 7.7 million departure seats over the same time period.
Of Norwegian’s 54 destinations, the carrier will face direct competition on 37 of them. However, the LCC is set to be the only operator from ARN on routes to Bastia (BIA), Budapest (BUD), Catania (CTA), London Gatwick (LGW), Sarajevo (SJJ), Santorini (JTR) and Tel Aviv (TLV).
Overall, Norwegian will offer 1.74 million departure seats from Arlanda this summer, compared with 2.56 million during summer 2019 when it served 70 destinations from the Swedish capital.
Destinations removed from its network since 2019 include Fort Lauderdale (FLL), Los Angeles (LAX) and New York John F Kennedy (JFK) after the airline decided to end all transatlantic operations and focus on short-haul flying in Europe.
As of January 2022, Norwegian flies to ARN from 15 destinations, including three domestic routes to Umea (UME), Lulea (LLA) and Kiruna (KRN).
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