Zürich will be served by Ethiopian Airlines from October, bringing to 16 its European passenger route network this winter. It comes as many of the Star Alliance member’s European routes change, mainly in terms of where they stop en route.
Ethiopian adds Zürich
Ethiopian will begin Zürich on October 31st. It’ll operate via Milan Malpensa in both directions. Like other European routes, Ethiopian will remain on the ground in Zürich all day to increase Africa-wide connections. This also enables aircraft to be wet-leased on a daily basis.
Zürich will have flights on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. It’ll be served by 315-seat B787-9s, with 30 in business and 285 in economy. The schedule is as follows, with all times local. It won’t have fifth freedom traffic rights:
- Addis Ababa to Milan Malpensa: ET736, 00:15-04:50
- Milan Malpensa to Zürich: ET736, 05:50-07:00
- Zürich to Milan Malpensa: ET737, 20:30-21:40
- Milan Malpensa to Addis Ababa: ET737, 22:30-07:05+1
Ethiopian will target the roughly 169,000 passengers that booking data shows traveled between Zürich and Africa in 2019. That excludes North Africa for circuity reasons and those who flew non-stop with SWISS as they’re unlikely to switch to a far less competitive two-stop option. Cape Town, Johannesburg, Windhoek, Seychelles, and Mombasa were the five largest markets.
Multiple other European changes
This winter, Brussels will be a so-called terminator service, whereby it won’t continue to Manchester. It’ll now be dependent on Brussels origin and destination traffic. It must be confident of filling the aircraft. If it doesn’t, loads, yields, and performance will reduce. The changes are summarized below:
h on October 31st. It’ll operate via Milan Malpensa in both directions. Like other European routes, Ethiopian will remain on the ground in Zürich all day to increase Africa-wide connections. This also enables aircraft to be wet-leased on a daily basis.
Zürich will have flights on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. It’ll be served by 315-seat B787-9s, with 30 in business and 285 in economy. The schedule is as follows, with all times local. It won’t have fifth freedom traffic rights:
- Addis Ababa to Milan Malpensa: ET736, 00:15-04:50
- Milan Malpensa to Zürich: ET736, 05:50-07:00
- Zürich to Milan Malpensa: ET737, 20:30-21:40
- Milan Malpensa to Addis Ababa: ET737, 22:30-07:05+1
Ethiopian will target the roughly 169,000 passengers that booking data shows traveled between Zürich and Africa in 2019. That excludes North Africa for circuity reasons and those who flew non-stop with SWISS as they’re unlikely to switch to a far less competitive two-stop option. Cape Town, Johannesburg, Windhoek, Seychelles, and Mombasa were the five largest markets.
Multiple other European changes
This winter, Brussels will be a so-called terminator service, whereby it won’t continue to Manchester. It’ll now be dependent on Brussels origin and destination traffic. It must be confident of filling the aircraft. If it doesn’t, loads, yields, and performance will reduce. The changes are summarized below:
- Addis Ababa-Brussels: 1x daily; no longer extending to Manchester, so 3x weekly terminator service (B787-9, A350-900), 4x weekly via Vienna (B787-9, B777-200LR)
- Addis Ababa-Manchester: will route via Geneva rather than Brussels; 4x weekly (B787-9)
- Addis Ababa-Milan: will be 1x daily non-stop rather than 1x daily via Rome; 4x weekly will be a terminator service (B777-200LR), 3x will continue to Zürich (B787-9)
- Addis Ababa-Rome: 1x daily will no longer continue to Milan; 4x weekly will be a terminator service (B777-200LR), 3x weekly will continue to Marseille (B777-200LR)
- Addis Ababa-Marseille: will route via Rome than Geneva; 3x weekly (B777-200LR)
