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Late last year, Air Italy announced that it planned on continuing its North American expansion by adding 3x weekly flights from Milan Malpensa airport to Chicago O'Hare. The flights were originally set to commence on May 13th, 2019. However, Air Italy has closed bookings for the route and told customers that it's pushing flights to Chicago off until 2020 (with no hard date announced).
Key Details
- Air Italy has postponed flights from Milan Malpensa to Chicago O'Hare until 2020
- Chicago will join New York City, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Toronto, and Miami as North American destinations
- Points collectors can redeem British Airways Avios for the flights once launched; 25K economy, 75K business
Our Take
It's sad to see Air Italy postpone the launch of its new Milan to Chicago route, and we hope to see the airline actually start flying the route next year.
For background, Air Italy launched in 2018 and is 49% owned by Qatar Airways. It has seen rapid expansion since its 2018 inception and launched routes to Bangkok, Delhi, New York City, and more. Unfortunately, Air Italy has already pulled flights from Bangkok and all Indian cities, prompting concerns about the airline's financial situation.
Featured image courtesy of Air Italy
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Hope to see this happen. Chicago needs more Italia flights.
I would have considered this if I still lived in Chicago.
I do not understand their business model.
This sounds like a great option for those in the Midwest!! Very cool.
How does Air Italy compare with Alitalia?
Its better late than never.
Sad to hear all of this. It will be interesting to see how this plays out.
This is not really a good redemption option at 75k when you can pay that for the same From U.K. being that Avios will predominantly be the main currency of U.K. collectors
Wow, 25K economy, 75K business using BA avios. Great news, thank you.
Frequent-flyer program: Meridiana Club; (Part of Avios Loyalty program)
So, partner with BA and Iberia……sorta? Seems odd
Thanks for the update. Hopefully it doesn’t get postponed again.
An interesting use of Avios for redemptions.
I hope Air Italy makes it! Hopefully the route cancellation doesn’t mean they are having troubles so soon.
I hope they add Phoenix at some point, we need more nonstops to southern Europe!
I’ve been looking forward to this. Hopefully there won’t be any further delays.
We’ll see if this lasts. As many have said, the cancellations are concerning.
This is definitely a flight I can see myself using.
Sounds intriguing. The rapid expansion and then cutting flights does makes a person worry. I wonder why they would try rapid expansion when other airlines have shown that this isn’t a good idea.
One year delay of this flight and some other cancellations have been made lately by Air Italy.
Maybe they need more airplanes.
What can ME airlines gain from investing in loss-making European airlines?
I wish them luck. Its nice to see addition to different European locations.
I would love to see the list of US cities expanded!
seems like an interesting airline to fly. but well never heard of this one.
Unfortunate delay, but it’s nice that it hasn’t been cancelled completely.
More options are always welcome… nice to have choice and might help keep the prices down.
meh, if AirItaly wanted the business bad enough then they would have moved the process along faster.
Chicago is a great hub, great choice!
I’m a little leary of financially unstable airlines. I’ve read too many horror stories of passengers being straded far from home.
I guess I should not save my BA Avios for my flight to Milan as this may never happen?
Can’t tell if I should get excited or not. Love the news of the added route back to dad’s homeland. However, the delay plus the pulling of flights in the East gives me pause.
I knew nothing about Air Italy. It seems like another good option to get to Europe, especially with the ability to redeem Avios, though the scaling back of routes doesn’t bode well. Thanks for the info.
Air Italy has certainly taken a strange approach to their route planning. So many of the new routes have been canceled already.
Does Air Italy belong to an alliance?
I mean, if they grow too quickly they could collapse. They’ve been expanding rapidly.
The British Airways association is definitely news to me.
This is the best part: Points collectors can redeem British Airways Avios for the flights once launched; 25K economy, 75K business
Good point! Wow even 25k Avios has a lot of value and is a good reason to book.
Honestly, this is definitely worth the wait!
Hopefully anyone who booked will be accommodated on Qatar.
25k avios round trip to Milan sounds nice but hate to see what taxes are
From the relatively small amounts of Avios needed for say, JFK to Malpensa, seems that this is really a budget airline. Any feedback on their level of service in business class?
… however, not a real surprise: the Italian aviation market has been as unstable as their governments for as long as I can remember… with discount carriers fighting each other win over tourists, and the national carrier a bottomless pit for government subsidies. Now, the discount carriers in turn are backed by foreign carriers, themselves subsidised by foreign governments. Not exactly a recipe for profitability!
Bingo! Thank you for the tip about BA Avios being usable for Air Italy flights. We do Italy periodically, can be flexible and this provides a additional avenue for Avios paid trips to Italy. Thank you ever so much!
Thanks for the update. It will be interesting to see how they do and if they last.
well its an interesting airline that i had not heard of. maybe its nice to get it on my list.
Air Italy would be a great option to fly from Chicago. I certainly hope this works out soon.
Does this mean you will be able to fly from Chicago as well or just going to Chicago?