Air New Zealand adds Airbus A321 on more domestic routes for Christmas

Air New Zealand is adding more capacity to its domestic schedule for Christmas, using bigger aircraft for three weeks on 350 flights as the demand for travel exceeds expectations. The airline is upgauging existing A320 services to A321 aircraft from Monday, December 7, until the end of December, adding 16,000 seats. This means about 80% of Auckland-Wellington services and about 25% of Auckland-Christchurch services will be operated by the new and larger A321 aircraft with 214 seats compared to the A320's 171. Air NZ, which this week came under fire for some high fares on commuter flights, said 550,000 seats will be available for under $100 for travel between December and February.<br/>Air NZ's chief customer and sales officer Leanne Geraghty said the upgauge was due to better-than-expected pre-Christmas and business travel demand. The airline has been running at about 75% of its pre-Covid domestic schedule and this will further boost that. Around the world, few domestic markets are running at such high capacity with the exception of China, which this month had slightly more domestic capacity than at the same time last year, according to OAG.<br/>