No-frills airline Ryanair has revealed it swung to a first-quarter profit despite airport disruption and a hit from the Ukraine war, but warned over soaring fuel costs. The Irish airline reported profits after tax of £145 million for the three months to June 30 against net losses of £233 million a year ago as passenger numbers rebounded to 45.5 million – nine per cent ahead of pre-Covid levels.
It said the Ukraine conflict “badly damaged” Easter bookings and fares, which fell four per cent against the same quarter pre-Covid, and claimed it was hampered by “unprecedented” air traffic control and airport handling disruption.
However, Ryanair stated it hoped to run “almost 100 per cent” of its scheduled flights and minimise delays but warned rocketing oil prices would push up its full-year fuel bill. Chief executive Michael O’Leary said: “Our decision to work with our unions and agree pay cuts to minimise job losses (and keep crews current) throughout the two years of Covid was vindicated in recent months, as many European airlines, airports, and handling companies struggled to restore jobs that were cut during the pandemic.
“Ryanair seems unusual among the major EU airlines in summer ’22, insofar as we are fully crewed, despite operating at 115% of our pre-Covid capacity. Our business, our schedules and our customers are being disrupted by unprecedented air traffic control and airport handling delays, but we remain confident that we can operate almost 100 per cent of our scheduled flights, while minimising delays and disruptions for our guests and their families.”
He added: “While we remain hopeful that the high rate of vaccinations in Europe will allow the airline and tourism industry to fully recover and finally put Covid behind us, we cannot ignore the risk of new Covid variants in autumn 2022.
“Our experience with Omicron last November, and the Ukraine invasion in February, shows how fragile the air travel market remains, and the strength of any recovery will be hugely dependent upon there being no adverse or unexpected developments over the remainder of 2022-23.”
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