Delta Airlines drops Bucharest-New York flight in autumn

Delta Airlines is set to drop its Bucharest-New York flight route for the second time this autumn, after it relaunched the route on June 8 last year, and flew around 50,000 passengers between June 2007 and May 2008 – an 80% occupancy rate in the summer and a 70% rate in the winter. “The company has decided to drop several of its less profitable flights,” said Corina Enciu, head of the Delta Airlines division in Romania, explaining the decision. Corina Enciu left the helm of the local office of British Airways a year and a half ago to take over the Delta Airlines subsidiary, which, over a year ago, was rumoured would coordinate the company’s Eastern European operations. However, the route has been dropped for the time being, according to the head of Delta’s Romanian office. “The route will not be operated over the winter, but will resume next summer, because in the summer we derive a higher added value.” Keeping the Romanian office could also be a plan to keep the door open for better times in the future, in particular when oil prices are lower. Corina Enciu says Delta’s decision comes amid an evaluation not so much of the occupancy rate, but of the value derived, given the costs of an over ten-hour flight. “They decided a route that involves Bucharest is not justified, given the extremely high costs, and they think we can maintain our clients with the aid of the Sky Team alliance until a final decision is reached,” says Corina Enciu. Delta also operated in Romania from the 1970s to 1998. The Bucharest route is the only one that Delta has decided to drop, which is the only direct flight that connects Bucharest and New York.