Norwegian has released its traffic figures for November.

The airline says the low figures are heavily influenced by lower demand caused by continued travel restrictions across Europe. However, the carrier has advised its Christmas bookings look promising.

In November, 124,481 customers flew with Norwegian. This is a decrease of 95 per cent compared to the same period last year. The capacity (ASK) for November was down 96 per cent, while total passenger traffic (RPK) decreased by 98 per cent. The load factor for the airline was 44.4 per cent, down 39 percentage points.

Jacob Schram, CEO of Norwegian commented on the results: “The pandemic continues to have a negative impact on our business as travel restrictions remain. The development of vaccines is great news for the airline industry, and we look forward to welcoming more customers on board as travel restrictions are lifted. Our goal is to be a financially strong and competitive airline, with a new financial structure, a rightsized fleet and improved customer offering.

“Our summer programme is now out for sale and the bookings are increasing. We can see that people are slowly beginning to plan for their summer holidays. It is also worth noting that we have added 62 departures this Christmas and that bookings look promising. Now, we look forward to flying our customers home for Christmas.”

Norwegian announced recently that it is forced to furlough 1,600 employees and reduce capacity considerably following the Norwegian Government’s decision to not support the company financially to get through the Covid-19 crisis while simultaneously imposing travel restrictions that actively discourage passengers from travelling.

Norwegian operated 72.7 per cent of its scheduled flights in November of which 94.8 per cent departed. The airline initiated a reorganisation plan in late November with its daughter companies Norwegian Air International and Arctic Aviation Assets seeking protection under Irish Examinership.