Los Angeles, USA, May 17, 2025 (Lusa) - Portuguese flag carrier TAP has inaugurated a direct flight between Los Angeles and Lisbon, occupying its own space at L.A. International Airport (LAX) for the first time, looking to the future, according to its CEO, Luís Rodrigues.
"It's a long-term investment," said the CEO of TAP, during the launch ceremony of the direct link at LAX on Friday, in statements to Lusa.
"The route starts as seasonal for risk management reasons, but we want it to continue all year round," he added.
TAP will have four weekly flights between the two cities until October, when it will evaluate whether to continue. "If this route performs better than others, we can and have the obligation to consider diverting resources here," emphasised Luís Rodrigues.
The executive pointed out that the city of Los Angeles will host two major sporting events in the near future: the Football World Cup in 2026 and the Olympic Games in 2028, which could generate good opportunities for a route linking southern California and the ‘gateway’ to Europe.
At the ceremony marking the inaugural flight out of LAX, at gate 204 of Terminal B, airport CEO John Ackerman emphasised the importance of having an airline of TAP's size investing in that destination.
"When a company like TAP makes the decision to start a route like this, it expresses confidence in our airport and our city, with a multi-year investment of several million dollars," he emphasised.
"We take this investment as seriously as you do and we are committed to the success of this flight," he added, emphasising that there hadn't been a direct route (by any airline) between Los Angeles and Lisbon for thirty years.
The first flight - LIS-LAX and LAX-LIS - flew with an occupancy rate of around 93%, which Luís Rodrigues considered to be very good for its debut.
"Portugal has become such a hot destination for North Americans that the market is much bigger now," the brand's head for North America, Gareth Edmondson-Jones, told Lusa, emphasising that the seasonality that used to be typical of summer is now more spread out over the whole year.
Edmondson-Jones believes that this new route will not cannibalise the San Francisco-Lisbon connection, which already has flights six days a week and will ‘probably’ become daily. "There are a lot of people in Southern California who want to go to Portugal and this won't take anything away from the San Francisco flight. It will add more people," he said.
TAP's expectation is that the new route will attract the Portuguese-American community in and around Los Angeles, as well as Americans who want to visit Portugal and Europe.
"The Portuguese community has more and more prestige in the United States and I hope that this will greatly influence Americans to visit our country and to visit the rest of Europe via Portugal," summarised Luís Rodrigues.
The airline's Stopover programme can help, as it allows travellers to stay up to 10 days in Portugal and then move on to other European destinations at no extra cost.
Also present at the ceremony, the Consul General of Portugal in San Francisco, Filipe Ramalheira, characterised the new flight as "a very convenient connection between two vibrant global cities" and a symbol of renewed proximity.
"For Portuguese entrepreneurs, students, artists and tourists, this route opens a door to the Pacific," he said.
"For Californians and Americans, it offers direct access to the Atlantic, the soul of Europe and the hospitality and dynamism of Portugal," he added.
The officials exchanged souvenirs and cut a symbolic ribbon before the first passengers boarded, who had the opportunity to eat malassadas (a Portuguese confection, made from balls of yeasted dough the size of eggs, which are fried in oil and coated with granulated sugar. This delicacy originated in the 16th century on the island of Madeira during the golden age of the island's sugar cane plantations) and cake while they waited to board.
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