London Southend Airport: AeroItalia scraps new flights to Milan just weeks after announcing them

An airline has confirmed that they will be scrapping all flights from a London airport to a popular European city - just weeks after announcing them. Flights to Milan have been removed from Southend Airport by AeroItalia. 

It comes after Southern bosses confirmed in January that they have partnered with AeroItalia to launch near-daily flights to Milan Bergamo. The flights between the Italian and UK capitals were due to start on 25 March at a starting price of £70 one way.

The routes were to be covered by the Italian start-up AeroItalia. It would have been the first route to connect the airport to Milan Bergamo with six weekly flights. Direct flights between the airport and Milan have not operated since 2021 when the budget airline Ryanair scrapped its four weekly flights.

The new route was introduced as part of the airport's recovery efforts since the pandemic. A spokesperson for Southend airport said: “At London Southend, we’re continuing to double our traffic year on year. Without our destinations growing rapidly from three to eleven over the past year, with existing and prospective partners, we expect to be announcing more exciting routes very soon. Milan remains firmly in our plans. We naturally wish AeroItalia well in their existing and domestic routes at this time.”

Plans to launch flights between Ancona and Split in Croatia have also been shelved. Low-cost airline Wizz Air also announced it is scrapping several routes from major UK airports within months.

The budget airline said it is ditching routes operating to Birmingham and Liverpool following reduced demand. All flights from the UK airports to Cluj-Napoca in Romania will cease as of 27 March.