Longyearbyen, Norway to see scheduled intl flights in 3Q2016

Finnair (AY, Helsinki Vantaa) says that during Summer 2016, it will become the first airline to offer scheduled international services to Longyearbyen, a Norwegian archipelago situated in the Arctic Ocean.

The Finnish carrier says it will operate a 3x weekly service to Helsinki Vantaa over the period June 1 to August 27, 2016.

"During Midsummer we will provide three weekly flights to Svalbard, which is mainly aimed at European customers, but can be also be connected from our Asian flights," Petri Vuori, Finnair's Vice President of Global Sales, said.

Situated midway between continental Norway and the North Pole, Longyearbyen is the world's northernmost commercial airfield. Currently, it is connected to the Norwegian mainland byNorwegian (DY, Oslo Gardermoen) and SAS Scandinavian Airlines (SK, Copenhagen Kastrup) which offer flights to Oslo Gardermoen and in the latter's case, Tromsø as well.