From Iceland — Icelandic Government To Pay For Icelandair's Losses

Icelandic Government To Pay For Icelandair’s Losses

Published March 31, 2020

Sam O'Donnell
Photo by
Maarten Visser

The Icelandic government will pay for Icelandair’s losses due to travel restrictions to Europe and the United States amid the COVID-19 epidemic, MBL reports. The agreement was reached on Friday evening, and is already in force. The government will pay a maximum of one hundred million ISK to the airline over the next three weeks, and the debt will be settled later.

As part of a separate agreement, the airline will continue to fly to Boston, London, and Stockholm two days a week. There are a minimum of six trips to each destination over the next three weeks, but it is possible that this arrangement will be extended.

One Icelandair plane flew from Keflavík to London Sunday morning. A total of 31 flights were canceled that day. Another flight flew to London yesterday morning, and another flew to Boston, so half of the flights have already been completed. If you have to get back to either the US or the UK, now would be a very good time to do so.

As ever, those looking for more information or advice should go to the Icelandic Government’s excellent COVID-19 help page.

Tune into our daily COVID-Cast for a deeper dive into the day’s developments.

Note: Due to the effect the Coronavirus is having on tourism in Iceland, it’s become increasingly difficult for the Grapevine to survive. If you enjoy our content and want to help the Grapevine’s journalists do things like eat and pay rent, please consider joining our High Five Club.

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