PACKAGE holiday operator and airline Jet2 has announced it to start flying from Bournemouth Airport next year - in a move that will create 100 new jobs. 

The low-cost airline will fly Bournemouth Airports passengers to 16 destinations from April 2025. 

Destinations include Spain, including the Canary Islands, Greece, Portugal and Turkey. 

Reading Chronicle:

What do you think? Email us a letter for publication at letters@bournemouthecho.co.uk 

The UK’s largest tour operator and third largest airline has today put 16 sunny destinations across Europe, the Canary Islands, and the Mediterranean on sale from Bournemouth Airport for Summer 25.

Jet2.com and Jet2holidays will operate up to 27 weekly flights, including multiple weekly flights to popular destinations across the Canary Islands, Balearic Islands, Turkey and Greece as well as services to hotspots such as mainland Spain, Portugal and Madeira (full list of destinations below).

Two destinations - Fuerteventura and Madeira - are exclusive to Jet2 from Bournemouth Airport.

Jet2.com and Jet2holidays’ summer programme from Bournemouth Airport: 

  • Tenerife – up to three weekly services
  • Fuerteventura – weekly services (Wednesdays) – exclusive from Bournemouth Airport.
  • Gran Canaria – weekly services (Sundays)
  • Lanzarote – up to two weekly services (Mondays, Fridays)
  • Alicante – up to two weekly services (Tuesdays, Saturdays)
  • Palma (Majorca) – up to four weekly services (Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays, Saturdays)
  • Ibiza - up to two weekly services (Thursdays, Sundays)
  • Menorca – weekly services (Sundays)
  • Antalya – up to two weekly services (Wednesdays, Saturdays)
  • Dalaman – up to two weekly services (Thursdays, Sundays)
  • Faro (Algarve) – up to two weekly services (Mondays, Fridays)
  • Madeira – weekly services (Thursdays) – exclusive from Bournemouth Airport.
  • Crete (Heraklion) – weekly services (Tuesdays)
  • Corfu – weekly services (Wednesdays)
  • Rhodes – weekly services (Tuesdays)
  • Zante – weekly services (Thursdays)

Reading Chronicle:

The first flight from the airport will take off to Tenerife on April 1, 2025

Steve Heapy, CEO of Jet2.com and Jet2holidays, said: “We know that customers and independent travel agents have been asking us for a long time to make this move, so we are absolutely delighted to be announcing today that Bournemouth Airport will become our 12th UK base airport.

"As Which? Travel Brand of the Year, we know that our award-winning flights and holidays will be enormously popular across the region, and we cannot wait to show everyone what we are all about.”

More than 100 new jobs will be created initially, with positions available across flight deck, cabin crew, engineering, and ground operations.

Mr Heapy added: “This latest expansion is a further demonstration of our confidence, and it reflects our long-term strategy to be the UK's leading and best leisure travel business.

"We know that customers want to be properly looked after throughout their holiday experience, and we are making a significant investment in the region including the creation of over 100 new jobs to do exactly that.

"From today, we are counting down to the start of operations from Bournemouth Airport when we can delight customers, just as we have with millions of other customers from across the UK for so many years.”

Andrew Bell, CEO of RCA, Regional and City Airports, which owns Bournemouth Airport, said: “This is fantastic news for passengers and represents a huge vote of confidence in Bournemouth Airport by Jet2.com and Jet2holidays, by choosing Bournemouth as their new base airport in what is a major expansion of their operations into the south of England.

"It will create new employment locally, add 16 fabulous new destinations from Bournemouth, up to 27 extra flights a week and will see an estimated additional 300,000 passengers using their local airport.”

Leeds Bradford-based airline Jet2 joins existing Bournemouth Airport airline operators TUI and Ryanair. 

Earlier this year, Ryanair announced it would be flying planes to a new continent for Bournemouth Airport: Agadir on the southwest coast of Morocco, Africa.

Bosses at the airport are expecting to welcome more than a million passengers through its terminal this year - a number it last hit 15 years ago in 2008.

As part of the anticipated growth, airport owners Regional and City Airports will be pumping more than £5m into new facilities, equipment, staff and training.

Bournemouth Airport has said passengers will notice several improvements over the coming months as part of the investment programme.

These include an upgraded security search area with new scanning kit to relax the restriction on liquids and the need to take electronics out of bags when the works are complete.

There will be a new airport information desk, improved baggage screening, an extra baggage retrieval area in the arrivals terminal, more Border Force desks in arrivals and improved queuing systems for passenger handling in both departures and arrivals.

More follows...