Air Italy to renew US services

Air Italy will serve four US destinations in summer 2020, despite complaints by several US airlines that it is effectively acting as a front for its largest shareholder, Qatar Airways. The Arab carrier holds a 49% stake in Air Italy and is leasing aircraft to re-fleet the Sardinia-based operator. The Italian carrier said July 15 it plans to resume services from Milan Malpensa to Los Angeles and San Francisco (as well as to Toronto) on March 29, 2020, while continuing existing year-round services to New York JFK (daily) and Miami (5X-weekly). Both the Los Angeles and San Francisco routes will be operated 4X-weekly next summer, while Toronto will be 6X-weekly. Air Italy COO Rossen Dimitrov said the airline plans to reinstate its three seasonal North American routes following “the excellent performance of our network during 2019.” US carriers American Airlines, Delta and United have strongly opposed the expansion by Air Italy of its US routes, with United CEO Oscar Munoz describing the latter airline as “the Italian version of Qatar.” He has argued that its US services fly in the face of US-Qatari air service agreements.<br/>