It’s been four years since flights to the Egyptian resort destination of Sharm el Sheikh were banned by the UK Government. However, this ban was lifted in late October and now leisure airline TUI is scheduling flights again. According to the Independent, TUI will wait three more months before it resumes packages to “Egypt’s leading Red Sea destination”.
Flights from the UK
Initially, TUI will operate flights from London Gatwick, Manchester and Birmingham with flights and holiday packages on sale beginning November 7th. As mentioned above, travel will not resume for several months – February 2020 to be specific. Services from Bristol and Doncaster-Sheffield airports will commence in May 2020.
“Sharm el Sheikh was always a hugely popular destination and I am delighted to confirm that we are reintroducing the Egypt favourite to our winter 2019 and summer 2020 programmes.” -Mark Hall, Tui UK’s Director of product and destination experience
History of the flight ban
The flight ban was the result of an October 2015 terrorist bombing of a Russian Metrojet Airbus A321. The charter flight was bound for St. Petersburg when it crashed shortly after take-off from the Egyptian resort. In the incident, all 224 passengers and crew were killed. Following the bombing, rescue flights were arranged to bring home 16,000 British holidaymakers.
The subsequent flight ban also contributed to the collapse of Monarch Airlines a British low-cost holiday airline. Monarch was heavily invested with packages to Sharm el Sheikh. The ban also didn’t help leisure airline Thomas Cook, which collapsed in September.
The Foreign Office is still warning against non-essential travel to the south Sinai region. The only exception is “the area within the Sharm el Sheikh perimeter barrier, which includes the airport and the areas of Sharm el Maya, Hadaba, Naama Bay, Sharks Bay and Nabq”.
Current offerings to Sharm el Sheikh
Currently, if you reside in the UK and wanted to fly to Sharm el Sheikh in the near future you would have to connect through a third location such as Istanbul or Cairo. Turkish carriers Pegasus and Turkish Airlines as well as EgyptAir offer one-stop itineraries to the resort destination. At this time prices range from £200 to £450.
With UK carriers easyJet and TUI coming back to the market in the near future, we can expect to see fares drop.
Conclusion
We reached out to TUI for a comment regarding this matter. More specifically we inquired about any flight details that may be available including aircraft and schedule. We will update this article if we receive any response. Otherwise, details should be available when flights go on sale on November 7th.
Will you be heading to Sharm el Sheikh on a Tui flight once operations resume in February? Let us know your travel and holiday plans by leaving a comment!
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