Norwegian Air Adds Three Nonstop Flights from the US to Paris
Norwegian Air is continuing its expansion across the Atlantic Ocean, becoming an even larger player in the US travel market. In 2015, the airline announced it was adding nonstop service from the Northeast (Baltimore [BWI], Boston [BOS] and New York [JFK]) to the Caribbean (Guadeloupe Islands [PTP] and Martinique [FDF]) — and starting one-way tickets were really cheap! Then, later last year, the airline made an exciting announcement that caught the ears of most US travelers in that it would begin offering $69 flights from the US to Europe as soon as 2017.
And now, Norwegian is continuing its expansion into the US market by announcing three new routes from the US to Paris' Charles de Gaulle Airport. The three new routes, from New York-JFK (beginning July 29), Los Angeles (LAX; beginning July 30) and Fort Lauderdale (FLL; beginning August 4) will be operated by the airline's new 787 Dreamliners. Once the service launches later this year, Norwegian will have 38 routes from US airports, with more nonstop routes than any of its European competitors, including destinations such as Las Vegas, Oakland and Orlando, among others.
Not only are the new routes a great, new way for travelers to get across the Atlantic Ocean, but they're also cheap — extremely cheap. Norwegian announced that it will kick off the new route with one-way fares starting at just $175 from the US to Paris, with taxes included. During summer peak periods (until the beginning of September), prices will be higher and vary depending on origin, but are still much less expensive than its competitors' offerings.
Don't forget that if you plan to book a flight on Norwegian, you can oftentimes save a significant amount of money by booking on the Norwegian version of the site. You'll have to go through the prompts in Norwegian, but it can save you big time in the end when converting fares from Norwegian Krone (NOK) to US dollars.
The same flight (LAX-CDG) is going for 1,398 Krone during the same month when booking on the Norwegian version of the site, which is about $163 — definitely hard to beat for a one-way flight from Los Angeles to Paris. By comparison, return flights from Paris to Los Angeles will run you about $230 during off-peak periods, so it's possible to book a round-trip flight for less than $400, including all taxes. Note that you will need to pay for things like checked luggage, seat assignments and meals.
The JFK-CDG route will run four times weekly (Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Sunday), whereas the LAX-CDG route will run two times per week (Tuesday and Saturday) and the FLL-CDG will run once per week (Thursday). Norwegian currently has flights out of Paris' Orly International Airport (ORY) to five destinations in Scandinavia, but these new Paris routes will be operated out of CDG because of available slots at the airport.
Both TPG Editor-in-Chief Zach Honig and TPG himself were impressed with Norwegian's premium product when they flew from New York to Oslo and London to New York, respectively. Overall, this sounds like a great deal and a bright sign of things to come for US travelers, as low-cost Norwegian Air plans to further extend its US route network in the near future.
H/T: USA Today
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