Aer Lingus Belfast to London flights have a poor take-off
Aer Lingus is putting a brave face on low bookings on its new Belfast to Heathrow flight.
The airline said it was "very happy" with bookings for just 50 of the 8,352 seats in the first eight days of the new service between the two airports.
"It's up to about 50 seats booked today, but that's not really the point," said a senior company source yesterday.
"For something like Heathrow you'd be talking about people booking a few weeks before they go, so we wouldn't be surprised not to have that many bookings now since flights don't start until mid-January.
"Overall, Aer Lingus has taken about 3,500 bookings across its Belfast services, with destinations like Geneva and Malaga proving particularly popular.
"The marketing campaign for Belfast won't start until September 24, so we are very happy to have those kind of volumes," added the source.
Ryanair launched a major expansion from Shannon in 2005 and is now responsible for 203 of Shannon's weekly flights.
