Air New Zealand Increases Domestic Capacity

Air New Zealand will be significantly increasing domestic seat capacity due to growing demand and the expected impact of the Rugby World Cup from January next year.

Air New Zealand General Manager Domestic Airline John Whittaker says the national carrier has been achieving very strong load factors on its domestic jet network, with January 2010 seeing the airline’s highest load factor on record.

“2011 promises to be a bumper year in New Zealand as the country creates a festival of events spanning 12 months, including arts, culture and sport, to leverage its hosting of the Rugby World Cup,” says Mr Whittaker.

“The additional capacity increase will also enable us to offer even more low airfares to our customers.”

Air New Zealand will be increasing its capacity overall by 10.5% on its domestic jet network from January 2011.

“We will be increasing this again later in the year to 26% additional capacity for the duration of the World Cup, in response to the forecast demand from both Kiwis and overseas travellers,” says Mr Whittaker.

The additional capacity will be achieved by the arrival of its new Airbus A320 fleet, plus the national carrier is extending the lease of one of its Boeing 737s by an additional eight months.

The new A320 aircraft will be configured with 171 seats, which is significantly more than the current domestic jet fleet of Boeing 737s which are configured with 133 seats.