Ireland’s Aer Lingus will launch service between Dublin Airport (DUB) and Denver International Airport (DEN) in 2024, becoming the only airline to fly the route.

Additionally, the carrier plans to restart service between DUB and Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport (MSP). The DUB-DEN route, to be exclusive to Aer Lingus, will commence from May 17, 2024. The DUB-MSP route, which has been suspended since early in the COVID-19 pandemic, will resume from April 29, 2024.

Aer Lingus notes in a statement that Denver has a “rich Irish heritage and vibrant Irish-American community.”

Both routes will initially be served 4X-weekly with Airbus A330 aircraft. The DUB-MSP service—not currently being flown nonstop by any carrier—will be increased to daily from October 2024, when Aer Lingus will start operating an A321XLR on the route.

“With Dublin’s geographic position as the gateway to Europe, [TSA] pre-clearance facilities at [DUB] and the strong, long-established Irish-American ties, Aer Lingus is ideally placed to connect people and places across the Atlantic,” Aer Lingus CEO Lynne Embleton says. 

She adds: “Denver and Minneapolis-St. Paul are significant business destinations within the U.S., and the new Aer Lingus routes facilitate corporate links and connectivity between Europe and North America, through our Dublin hub. Denver’s position as the ‘Gateway to the Rockies’ and its outdoor appeal, from world-class skiing to hiking, opens up a whole new U.S. experience to leisure travelers from Ireland and Europe.”

Aer Lingus plans to operate to 18 North American airports in 2024.

DEN reports that June 2023 was “the busiest month of passenger traffic ever for the airport,” with the Colorado airport handling 6.77 million monthly passengers. That was up 8.2% over June 2022 and up 6% versus June 2019.

“Overall passenger traffic in the first half of the year reached an all-time high of more than 36.5 million passengers, an increase of 13.6% from the prior year and 11.8% above the first half of 2019,” DEN says.