Spanish national carrier Iberia has launched a fifth weekly rotation on its Madrid – Panama City route and introduced larger Airbus A340-600s on the route to meet with growing passenger demand. The A340-600 replaces smaller A340-300s on some of the weekly flights, offering around 100 seats more on these particular flights. Iberia first launched flights between these destinations more than 40 years ago, inaugurating a Madrid - Santo Domingo – Panama - Guatemala route on April 7, 1971 using a Douglas DC-8.
The airline, part of the International Consolidated Airline Group (IAG), has witnessed a growth in traffic on the route during the last calendar year having boosted frequencies during 2011. In the full year it handled some 90,000 passengers according to company data, up 35 per cent on the previous year when it had provided just 77,000 seats to the market. This increase in traffic has meant load factors have grown above the 80 per cent figure.
“No other Iberia route grew as strongly as Madrid-Panama, meeting our highest expectations,” said Maria Esther Fernández, Central America Manager, Iberia. “Our aim is to continue to grow, and as soon as possible to offer flights every day which, along with the improvements to both tourist and business class seating sections, will enable Iberia to offer a product that is hard to beat.”
With the additional frequency and increase in aircraft capacity, Iberia will increase the available seats on the route to 145,000 in 2012, a 33 per cent increase on last year. In 2011, Iberia’s market share between Spain and Panama climbed to 69 per cent and its share of the greater Europe – Panama market reached 34 per cent. According to the carrier, when you consider Business Class passengers the figures are even stronger with 87 per cent and 43 per cent shares of the traffic, respectively.
For Iberia this route is not just about point-to-point demand with only a third of passengers beginning or ending their journey at its Madrid Barajas. According to statistics, around 23 per cent of passengers begin or end their journeys at other Spanish airports (with Barcelona, Vigo and Valencia the top three) while 44 per cent originate or depart to other Iberia destinations in Europe, Africa or the Middle East – the main markets are Italy, France, Israel and Germany.
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