This weekend, airlines announced cuts to their international flights in response to the sudden drop in travel demand resulting from the spread of the coronavirus and subsequent travel bans. But, travelers who must fly from the United States to points far afield still can — at least for now.
For their part, airlines want to keep flying as much as they can — their international routes are among the most lucrative they operate. Most are phasing out routes over the coming days and many are making frequent schedule updates. Airlines are each moving at their own pace; travelers beware.
The major U.S. carriers: American Airlines, Delta and United
The American trans-Atlantic carriers announced major service changes over the weekend affecting travel between the United States, Europe, Britain, South America and Australia. Those changes are on top of flight cancellations to Asia made earlier in the year.
American Airlines
American Airlines announced Saturday it would reduce many of its international flights until at least May 6. This includes flights from New York, Chicago and Los Angeles to London Heathrow and Los Angeles to Sydney, among other popular destinations. American said it would continue to operate one flight daily from Dallas and Miami to London and three flights per week between Dallas and Tokyo.
American is maintaining service flights to and from Canada, Mexico, the Caribbean, Central America and the northern part of Latin America. American’s Latin American network is its crown jewel, developed over the past 30 years. The airline is suspending service between the United States and Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo (and other cities in Brazil and Colombia from Miami), and reducing service to Chile, Colombia, Ecuador and Peru.
Delta Air Lines
On Saturday, Delta announced to passengers it would continue to operate one flight daily between Atlanta and Amsterdam, Atlanta and Paris and Atlanta and London. In addition, the airline will operate one flight daily between Detroit and Amsterdam and New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport to London. The airline said it will continue to fly to South Africa, Ghana, Senegal and Nigeria.
The airline announced the suspension of flights between Kennedy airport and Mumbai, and all service to Colombia, Guatemala, Ecuador and St. Maarten (in response to those countries restricting travel from the United States).
United Airlines
United Airlines said it will continue to fly its regular schedule from Europe to the United States through March 20. After March 20, the airline will operate daily flights to London, Frankfurt, Munich, Dublin, Amsterdam, Brussels, Paris and Zurich — with London and Frankfurt receiving three flights per day.
The foreign carriers
Foreign carriers will continue to fly in and out of the United States to maintain “at least some air traffic connections to the USA from Europe,” according to Lufthansa. And you have options with carriers such as Emirates and Turkish Airlines to connect to the rest of the world.
Air France
In a statement on its website, Air France said it “plans to continue operations to Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Detroit, Los Angeles, Miami, New York JFK, San Francisco and Washington.” The airline said it is working with its partners in the SkyTeam alliance (KLM, Delta Air Lines and Virgin Atlantic) on implementing a plan to continue service to and from the United States beyond March 28.
Air Canada
Air Canada has not reduced flights between Canada and the United States. It operates 20 flights per day between Toronto and New York. The Star Alliance carrier has reduced service between Toronto, Montreal and seasonal destinations in Europe.
Lufthansa
The airline will continue to operate service to Chicago, Newark and Washington Dulles — major hubs for its code-share partner, United Airlines. Austrian Airlines, part of the Lufthansa Group that also includes SWISS, announced it would temporarily stop flying entirely, as of Wednesday.
British Airways
British Airways is a key partner to American Airlines in its trans-Atlantic routes as part of the Oneworld alliance. So far British Airways has not announced service reductions on its flagship routes between New York and London. British Airways’s London hub is a major connecting point for Europe, the Middle East, Africa and Asia.
Norwegian Airlines
The low-cost carrier, already struggling financially, announced today it would stop all trans-Atlantic flights effective March 25 and would only fly a limited short-haul schedule in Scandinavia.
S.A.S.
The Scandinavian carrier said in a news release that it would continue to operate between Copenhagen, Stockholm and Newark and Copenhagen to Chicago, as well as its domestic routes and flights to and from Europe.
What about flights to other destinations?
A recent trend for airlines has been to fly direct between cities, skipping connections through hubs. Cities that previously were never directly connected — such as London and Austin, Texas — have benefited from nonstop service from the likes of British Airways. However, direct flights from smaller centers to major international hubs will be the first cut, regardless of the airline.
Other carriers, such as Emirates and Turkish Airlines, have a different approach — the so-called “hub and spoke” model. Each of those airlines can connect passengers to the far reaches of the world through their hubs in Dubai and Istanbul, respectively. If you need to get somewhere, even during this crisis, consider searching for flights directly with those carriers. Neither Dubai nor Turkey is covered by the existing United States travel bans.
A tip for travelers and request from the airlines
Book and change your new and existing reservations online or through the airlines’ mobile apps, if you can. Because of increased call volumes experienced by airline customer call centers, several airlines have requested that passengers not traveling within the next 72 hours wait before contacting the airline.
