Passengers Suffer as Crowded Field Puts Pressure on Europe’s Airlines<br />“Low-cost carriers and network carriers enjoy huge flexibility because of E. U.<br />membership and liberal aviation agreements,” said Andrew Lobbenberg, an analyst at HSBC.<br />“The low-cost airlines have got such a big presence in Europe and they stimulated markets that didn’t exist,” Mr. Wober said.<br />The six largest airline groups in the United States now make up about 80 percent of flights in<br />and out of the country, according to Jonathan Wober, chief financial analyst at CAPA Centre for Aviation, a research company.<br />“We had the possibility to buy new tickets on our own,<br />but I can’t imagine what would happen if someone had their flight canceled when he’s at the airport already or the day before.”<br />The falling away of poorly performing airlines can be a positive: weeding out weaker, inefficient carriers, and portending much-needed consolidation.<br />Ryanair had to cancel thousands of flights in recent weeks because of staffing problems, including strikes in France<br />that forced Ryanair and other airlines to cancel flights this week.<br />“Passengers have had a really good run for a long time with incredibly cheap tickets,”<br />said Andrew Charlton, managing director of Aviation Advocacy, a consultancy.<br />Monarch and Ryanair, along with rivals like easyJet, Eurowings, Jet2<br />and Wizz Air, brought service to well-trodden destinations like Paris or the beaches of Portugal, as well as far-flung corners of the Continent like Lappeenranta, Finland, or Varna, Bulgaria.
