Lufthansa
only has routes that begin and end in Germany, right? Not quite. It has one route that does not touch its homeland at all. To make it even more intriguing, it only operates weekly in the winter. Having first been served in winter 2023/2024, it will return in December.

Lufthansa: London Heathrow to Salzburg

This 569 nautical mile (1,054 km) link is entirely separate from its German operations from its Frankfurt and Munich hubs. This has nothing to do with one-stop, same-plane, same-flight-number services, whether with fifth-freedom traffic rights or not, which many airlines, including Lufthansa, have.

LHR-SZG map

Image: GCMap

Why Salzburg? It is Austria’s second most populous city. It is quite a winter destination because of skiing, its famous mountainous backdrop, and Christmas markets. More than this, it was the birthplace of Mozart, the location of the Sound of Music, and has a UNESCO heritage center.

British Airways
also has Heathrow-Salzburg flights, operating on Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays from December 6. BA EuroFlyer, easyJet, and TUI are from Gatwick, Jet2, Ryanair, and TUI are from Stansted, and easyJet and Wizz Air are from Luton. Needless to say, Saturday is by far the most-served day, with Cirium data showing it has 40% of winter flights.

In the year to July 2024, London-Salzburg had more than 280,000 roundtrip point-to-point passengers.

How is Lufthansa’s service scheduled?

First launched on December 16, 2023, the Austrian service will return on December 14, 2024. It will operate on Saturdays until March 29, the day before northern airlines, including Lufthansa, will switch to summer schedules. It is scheduled as follows, with all times local:

  • London Heathrow-Salzburg: LH2673, 11:10-14:10 (2h block)
  • Salzburg-London Heathrow: LH2674, 16:00-17:05 (2h 5m)

The route will use the 180-seat Airbus A320neo. The aircraft and crew will be based in Munich, with the flight arriving at Heathrow from the Bavarian hub at 10:25. It’ll then operate to/from Austria on an entirely separate service. It will leave for Munich at 17:50 and get home at 20:40. The standalone Austrian route will be served on a so-called ‘W’ pattern.

Hang on: what is it all about?

As the UK is no longer in the EU, it does not have EU open skies, which enables an airline from any member country to fly to, from, or within other EU states on flights that do not touch their homeland. This agreement underpins the pan-European giants Ryanair, easyJet, and Wizz Air, together with smaller players Vueling and Volotea, without which they’d each be a fraction of their size.

Following Brexit, Lufthansa’s Austrian route is possible because UK-EU traffic rights remain open and liberal. Numerous other examples show this, especially Ryanair using the ‘FR’ IATA code and EI-registered aircraft on numerous flights from UK bases to EU countries. The code and EI-registered aircraft belong to its Irish unit, suggesting any EU carrier—including Lufthansa—can fly from member states to/from the UK.

Lufthansa A320neo

Photo: Markus Mainka | Shutterstock

While network and full-service carriers could set up shop in another EU nation, this is rarely done in practice, particularly for branding, awareness, and hub reasons. It is a risky endeavor and, for many operators, unnecessary. Still, aside from Lufthansa’s Salzburg offering, they do exist, including LOT Polish between London City and Vilnius and from Budapest to Seoul Incheon.

The most famous example is Air France’s purely standalone service between Heathrow and Los Angeles, which was possible because of EU-US open skies. Lufthansa also had its short-lived Lufthansa Italia operation at Milan Malpensa.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *