Air NZ cuts domestic services again to fall to 5% of pre-crisis level

2nd April 2020 By Staff Reporter | news@tourismticker.com | @tourismticker

Air New Zealand has again cut services reducing domestic capacity by 95% from pre-Covid-19 levels.

The new schedule would allow for essential travel only and to keep air freight moving.

“Domestic travel is still an option but is extremely limited while New Zealand is at alert level 4, and we have updated our schedule to reflect this,” said Air New Zealand chief revenue officer Cam Wallace.

“In the coming weeks we will be operating a limited number of flights a day using our A320 jet aircraft, as well as our ATR and Q300 turboprop aircraft.”

The carrier would normally fly more than 400 domestic flights daily.

“Kiwis are respecting the Government’s essential travel only advice, however, we still ask customers to please check they qualify to travel under the essential services list before booking a ticket or going to the airport,” added Wallace.

Air New Zealand would operate ad hoc domestic charter flights at the request of the New Zealand Government. These flights could be undertaken to all domestic airports within New Zealand within a matter of hours.

The new schedule is as follows:

Route	Services	Aircraft type
Auckland-Christchurch	3x return services Mon-Fri 1x return service Sat/Sun	A320
Auckland-Wellington	1x return service Mon-Sun	A320
Wellington-Christchurch	2x return services Mon-Fri 1x return service Sat/Sun	Q300 ATR
Wellington-Nelson	1x return service Mon-Fri	Q300
Christchurch-Dunedin	1x return service Mon 1x return service Fri	ATR