South African Airways (SAA) is no longer scheduling extra flights after the backlog created by volcanic ash over parts of Europe was cleared, the airline said on Wednesday.
The initial six-day grounding of flights to and from Europe has, however, set the airline back by R14-million per day, said spokesperson Fani Zulu.
“It caused a revenue loss of R14-million per day until the day the skies were opened on April 20,” Zulu said.
Thirteen thousand SAA passengers and 51 flights were grounded during that period.
“For us it was important that we pulled out all the stops to clear the backlog as quickly as possible,” he said.
The airline needed to turn its attention to the upcoming Fifa World Cup.
The last special flight to clear the backlog flew out on Saturday.
Zulu said if any more stranded passengers turned up, the airline would accommodate them. –Sapa