Lufthansa is to offer longhaul services from Berlin Tegel airport next spring with the launch of a six-times weekly Airbus A340-200 flight to Washington DC.
Chairman and chief executive Jürgen Weber says he believes the route can be made profitable due to the relocation of the German Government to Berlin and because of the German flag-carrier's ability to offer onward connections to some 60 US cities through its alliance partner United Airlines.
There have been several abortive attempts to establish transatlantic services from Berlin, the most recent of which ended in early 1998 when a US carrier terminated direct flights to New York.
Weber admits that Lufthansa is taking on a "high entrepreneurial risk" and is urging "all companies, commercial institutions, politicians and business federations, who have voiced demands, to use this non-stop flight." Failure would be detrimental principally to Berlin.
"Berlin and [the federal state of] Brandenburg have only themselves as a catchment area," he adds.
Source: Flight International
