Austrian Airlines, the flag carrier of Austria and an airline of the Lufthansa Group, has announced that starting 18 March, 2020, it will temporarily stop its regular flight operations.

Reacting to just initial consequences of the coronavirus spread forcing numerous counties to close their borders, Austrian will cancel all its flights up until 28 March, 2020. The time frame might change depending on the demand.

For the time being, the last Austrian Airlines flight will come to Vienna from Chicago in the morning on 19 March.

In the coming days the airline will increasingly carry out evacuation flights and rely upon the offering of the Lufthansa Group for rebooking passengers.

Nevertheless, Austrian Airlines stays positive about its relaunch after the crisis slows down.

“The airline is taking a flexible approach towards restarting the business “so that we can be ready to go as soon as possible once demand recovers”, CEO Alexis von Hoensbroech explains, “This is not a ‘goodbye’, it’s a ‘servus’ and ‘see you later'”, the statement says.