On Friday, September 18th, SWISS took delivery of its very first A321neo from Airbus. The brand new aircraft is the first of a total of eight A321neos ordered by the Lufthansa Group airline. While the plane isn’t taken any flights in the past week, it won’t be too long before seeing this brand new jet take to the skies. So, where will it be flying to?
Based in Zurich
With the aircraft based at the SWISS hub of Zurich, it will connect the major industrial city in Switzerland to other major cities across Eastern and Western Europe.
- Athens (Greece) – ATH
- Belgrade (Serbia) – BEG
- Berlin Tegel (Germany) – TXL
- Hamburg (Germany) – HAM
- Lisbon (Portugal) – LIS
- Malaga (Spain) – AGP
- Moscow Domodedovo (Russia) – DME
- Naples (Italy) – NAP
- Palermo (Italy) – PMO
- Porto (Portugal) – OPO
- St. Petersburg (Russia) – LED
The information is accurate as of September 25th and is subject to change.
As you can see, SWISS‘ new A321neow ill be flying quite close to home, far short of its full range- which, from Zurich, could take it as far as sub-Saharan Africa, the Middle East, and India. This may simply be a result of the fact that SWISS doesn’t have too many destinations to begin with. Its network is relatively small, especially when compared to its partner and fellow Group member, Lufthansa.
Of course, now, with this long-range, low-capacity aircraft, perhaps the airline could indeed operate to more far-flung destinations in the future when demand recovers.
Final services to Berlin Tegel
While those flying from Zurich to Berlin in October may find themselves on a brand new plane, they will ultimately end up at an old airport. Upon the order of French military authorities, Berlin Tegel was constructed in 1948 and was the airport for West Berlin, occupied by Western powers. Tegel, along with its eastern counterpart, Berlin Schönefeld Airport, has been disappointing travelers for decades.
Having overcome years upon years of delays, both airports will give way to Berlin’s new Brandenburg Airport (BER), scheduled to open in just over a month, on October 31st.
Thus FTNNews notes that SWISS will commence its new operations to and from Berlin Brandenburg on November 8th. The SWISS reservation system has already been reconfigured to reflect the move, and customers who book a flight to Berlin for travel on or after November 8th will see the airport code BER rather than TXL.
With these destinations now published, will you be booking a flight to get on this new aircraft? Let us know in the comments.
The schedule information in this article was originally published by Routesonline
