January 2021 is set to be another month of growth for Singapore-based low-cost carrier Jetstar Asia, which is slowly rebuilding its network across South East Asian cities. The airline will see a 61% increase in flights programmed in the first month of next year compared to early December 2020.
The increases come as the airline enters its second month of approval to carry passengers on transit itineraries through Singapore Changi Airport, no doubt assisting with load factors.
January 2021
From 18th January 2021, Jetstar Asia will add twice weekly Yangon flights to its passenger network. This will make Jetstar the sole operator between Singapore and Myanmar.
At the same time the airline will increase frequencies to daily or greater on some other routes like Kuala Lumpur and Jakarta.
However, flights to and from Bangkok have already ceased, with this route now served exclusively by Singapore Airlines and Scoot, so Jetstar’s total destination count will remain at nine.
Based on FlightRadar24 data over the last week, Jetstar Asia continues to fly just three of its 18 Airbus A320s. The airline has already completed a downsizing exercise, which will see five of these 18 aircraft leaving the company by 2021, for a resized total of 13 jets post-COVID.
Overall Jetstar Asia will operate 74 flights per week in late January 2021, a 61% increase on early December 2020’s 46 flights per week. The airline usually operates around 620 flights per week, based on January 2020 data.
That lifts the airline’s capacity by flight volumes in the first month of next year to around 12% of January 2020 levels, just before COVID-19 hit.
Assuming the airline will recover to around 72% of its original size post-COVID-19 with a fleet of 13 Airbus A320s, in theory over 16% of its ultimate future schedule is already being operated.
Here’s how the frequency changes by late January 2021 look compared to early December 2020.