—First, a cancellation: Avianca Brazil, which is trying to crawl out of bankruptcy by, in part, trimming the size of its fleet while keeping its most efficient and high-yield routes, will stop flying on March 31 to Miami and New York, which are its only two U.S. destinations. It is not clear if—but it definitely seems unlikely—that, after the carrier finalizes a restructuring program, the airline will ever have service to the U.S. again. Since the restructuring plan is still work in progress, it is unclear if another airline will attempt to replace the Avianca Brazil service. The discontinued routes to New York and Miami (in addition to another route to Santiago, Chile), represented about 40,000 seats a year.
—TAP Air Portugal will triple its flights between Newark and Porto, Portugal starting June 1, flying six weekly nonstop round-trips. Also, the airline is adding new service from Porto to Brussels, Lyon and Munich which means U.S. travelers can now enjoy a stopover of up to five days in Porto, en route to 14 European destinations from Newark. The others include: Belgium; Paris and Lyon, France; Munich, Germany; Milan, Italy; Luxembourg; Amsterdam, The Netherlands; Barcelona and Madrid, Spain; Geneva and Zurich, Switzerland; and London, United Kingdom. TAP introduced the Portugal Stopover program in 2016 for travelers flying throughout Europe and Africa. Now they can break the trip and enjoy two destinations for the price of one, for no extra airfare.
—Also, TAP is adding service to Lisbon from Chicago O’Hare, San Francisco, and Washington-Dulles, starting June 1, 10 and 16, respectively.
—On December 19, American Airlines began flights between Dallas/Fort Worth and Oaxaca, Mexico. Service on the nearly 1,100-mile route will operate daily.
—Viva Air Colombia launched flights on December 18 between Santa Marta, Colombia and Miami. The low-cost carrier will operate the 1,087-mile route three times weekly, offering departures on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays. No other airline presently links the two airports.
—American Airlines began service earlier this month, on January 6, from Charlotte Douglas Airport in Charlotte, N.C., to Guadalajara. It will be competing for passengers with low-cost Mexican carrier Volaris, which operates flights on the same route.
