Bahrain’s national carrier Gulf Air announced the closure of its services to four destinations i.e. Damascus, Athens, Milan and Kuala Lumpur. Services to Damascus will be stopped from March 2nd while flights to Athens and Milan will be stopped from March 12th and Kuala Lumpur will be from March 25th 2012. This follows the announcement of the closure of Entebbe and Geneva routes earlier this month.
The move comes as the airline seeks to address the economic challenges faced in recent times; in particular, the local and regional political situation, the high price of fuel and low passenger numbers.
The decision has been taken to allow the airline to use its fleet and resources in the most efficient way by concentrating on high-demand, high-yield routes to ensure that its core customer base is served effectively.
“It is currently a challenging business environment for airlines around the world. These closures are pragmatic commercial decisions aimed at focusing services on routes with higher passenger traffic. Our commercial strategy, developed in 2009, delivered significant gains in 2010 but last year has been challenging. Therefore, we are now adapting our approach to address the challenges on an urgent basis,” Gulf Air’s Chief Executive Officer, Samer Majali, said.
Gulf Air realizes that this will be disappointing news to some of its customers and regrets the inconvenience this may cause. Passengers, who have confirmed bookings (both onward and return) to these destinations on or after 02 March /12 March /25 March, are being informed of the closures. Customers are requested to contact Gulf Air World Wide Contact Centre on + 973 17373737 or local contact centres for alternate travel options or refunds.