Yesterday, Mexican carrier Viva Aerobus announced a new route from Los Angeles to Merida, and in less than 24 hours the first flight was fully booked.
High demand to Los Angeles
Viva Aerobus is a young, low-cost airline in Mexico. Founded in 2006, the airline has already carried more than 60 million passengers and has grown its workforce to more than 2,000. Viva Aerobus is an all-Airbus operator and its fleet stands at more than 100 aircraft, averaging 7.8 years.
Yesterday, Viva announced its newest route to the United States, connecting Merida to Los Angeles. The first flight, scheduled to depart Aeropuerto Internacional Manuel Crescencio Rejón on December 18, will operate just once weekly for four weeks. According to the airline’s website, the flight from Los Angeles International Airport to MID is blocked out at 5h35m.
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According to the Yucatán Magazine, the first flight from Los Angeles sold out in less than 24 hours. At an event in Yucatan yesterday, Viva Aerobus executives and local officials spoke on the importance of the new route, along with another service that will launch to Tijuana.
“Los Angeles is a route that we have been pursuing for years. It is a complex route because of how long it is. We are going to do the first test in December.” – Michelle Fridman, Secretary of Tourism, Yucatan
According to Walter Castro Novelo, the airline’s Director of Corporate Communications, the addition of the new routes will bring the number of destinations served from Yucatan to 16. This includes the new route to Tijuana, which launches in November, and flights to Orlando and Miami, which launch in a few weeks.
“At Viva, we are committed to investing in Mérida. We recognize the city’s immense potential, along with that of the entire Yucatán region, and we aim to contribute to its development through improved national and international connectivity.”
About Viva’s route network
The new flight to Los Angeles will be Viva’s fifth-longest route this December. The distance between the two cities is 1,968 miles, only three miles longer than the current fifth-longest route from Mexico City to Bogotá. Details about which aircraft type will operate the flights to LAX are not yet available.
The longest flight in Viva’s network is from Monterrey to Bogotá, flown just twice-weekly in December. The route is flown by the airline’s Airbus A320s. The second-longest route is also to Bogotá but from Guadalajara, and is only seven miles shorter than from Monterrey. The airline has two more routes over 2,000 miles, and only one is international, from Mexico City to New York City.
At 126 miles, Viva’s shortest route is from Puerto Vallarta to Guadalajara. According to data from Cirium, the airline connects the two cities up to three times daily in December. This flight is one of seven in the airline’s network under 200 miles. In December, Viva has 15,008 roundtrip flights scheduled, offering nearly three million seats. Of those, nearly 2,000 flights are to international destinations, amounting to almost 400,000 seats.