British Airways Begins Direct Service To Ivalo Airport In Finland For Prime Northern Lights Viewing

British Airways
has launched its first-ever service from London Gatwick to Lapland, Finland.

Seasonal service for the Northern Lights

Nearly one week ago, British Airways began its first service from London Gatwick Airport
(LGW) to Finland. According to data (which dates back to 2003) from Cirium, an aviation analytics firm, the airline has not served Finland from LGW. The new route is to Ivalo Airport (IVL) in Lapland, Finland.

The new route will operate twice-weekly through February 25. The Airbus A320
has been chosen to operate the 1,517-mile route. According to Cirium, the configuration deployed to IVL has 177 seats.

Flights are operating on the following schedule:

According to TTG media, Des O’Connor, the airline’s manager of revenue management at Euroflyer said,

“We’d been looking at Ivalo for around 12 months and finally pressed the green button in April 2024 for the service to begin in December.”

He added that the process for adding a route is complex and requires analysis, speaking with tourism and airport authorities, and more. O’Connor said that pretty much the whole organisation is involved. The flight schedule has been created to maximize time on the ground in Switzerland.

The arrival allows passengers to arrive and do some exploring during the day while the departure allows for some activities in the morning. O’Connor added that operations have been spaced out so that three, four, or seven-day trips can be planned.

Ivalo is a great destination for Northern Lights viewing. Additionally, there is sledding and snowboarding nearby and resorts.

Additional service to Ivalo

British Airways is one of four airlines operating flights from Gatwick to Finland this winter, and one of two operating specifically to Ivalo. TUI Airways, like British Airways, is offering two weekly flights. TUI’s operations are on the following schedule:

TUI’s flights are not set on this schedule and change depending on the day. For the LGW-IVN route, TUI uses both its Boeing 737-8s (MAX 8s) and its 737-800s, all of which have a single-cabin configuration with 189 seats. Between the two airlines, there are a total of 32 flights between Gatwick and Lapland, with more than 5,800 seats available.

Data shows that nine airlines are serving Lapland with commercial flights this month. Finnair, the Finnish flag carrier has the largest operation by far, with more than 200 flights. British Airways already has a larger market share larger than seven other airlines. The list of airlines operating at IVL is as follows:

Finnair

British Airways

Eurowings

Lufthansa

TUIfly Netherlands

Smartwings

Transavia France

TUI Airways

Vueling

There are 297 flights scheduled at Ivalo, with more than 53,000 seats available. Summer operations drop significantly, as demand is higher in the winter. Finnair is scheduled to be the only airline operating out of IBL in July, with two different routes.