Leisure airline has carried more than 16 million customers since launch

MONTREAL, July 1, 2017 /CNW Telbec/ - Air Canada Rouge is celebrating its birthday today, marking four years of providing customers memorable beginnings and endings to their journeys. From its first flight on Canada Day 2013, Air Canada's leisure carrier has grown to 49 aircraft from four, created 1,800 incremental jobs and flown more than 16 million customers.

"Air Canada Rouge has proven itself to be tremendously popular with customers, as shown by steady growth that today has it operating more than 100 routes, up from an original 14. It has also been a key driver of Air Canada's strategy, enabling us to increase capacity, add frequencies and compete effectively in leisure markets to give our customers an ever-expanding choice of destinations and travel options. I commend the employees of Air Canada Rouge for their dedication to creating memorable travel experiences and thank our customers for choosing Air Canada Rouge and making it so successful over these last four years," said Benjamin Smith, President, Passenger Airlines at Air Canada.

Since the beginning of this year alone, Air Canada Rouge has begun offering service on a variety of exciting new international routes, including: Montreal to Algiers, Marseilles and Reykjavik; Toronto to Berlin and Reykjavik; and Vancouver to Nagoya and London-Gatwick. New services beginning this fall include: Montreal to Lima and Phoenix; Toronto to Cartagena, Belize City and St. Vincent; and Vancouver to Orlando.

Since it began flying on July 1, 2013, Air Canada Rouge has continually enhanced its services for customers. This year, Air Canada Rouge began offering high-speed, satellite internet aboard its aircraft. Air Canada Rouge customers now have access to the fastest internet service on a Canadian airline, giving them the ability to email, stream video and music, surf the web and more while flying. All Air Canada Rouge Airbus A319s now offer connectivity and installation of the service on all Air Canada Rouge A321 and Boeing 767-300ER aircraft will be complete by the end of 2018.

Other Air Canada Rouge milestones:

• Over 16 million customers served - and counting
• 1,260 Rouge Crew (our name for Flight Attendants), with 330 hired since January 2017
• Over 600 pilots at Rouge, with more than 100 hired since January 2017, plus additional new pilot positions at Air Canada mainline
• Flown over 317 million kilometres – that's almost 8,000 trips around earth in equivalent distance!
• Added 33 new routes to the overall Air Canada network, including Air Canada's first regularly scheduled flight to Africa, extending Air Canada's global network to six continents.
• Over 12,600 pieces of toiletries collected by Air Canada Rouge Crew donated to nine different charities across Canada in the last year
• Over 400 hours of Rouge Crew volunteer time contributed to local charities and causes in the last year

For more information, visit flyrouge.com or to book a flight visit aircanada.com. Connect with Air Canada Rouge on Facebook at facebook.com/aircanadarouge and on Instagram at instagram.com/aircanadarouge.

About Air Canada

Air Canada is Canada's largest domestic and international airline serving more than 200 airports on six continents. Canada's flag carrier is among the 20 largest airlines in the world and in 2016 served close to 45 million customers. Air Canada provides scheduled passenger service directly to 64 airports in Canada, 57 in the United States and 95 in Europe, the Middle East, Africa, Asia, Australia, the Caribbean, Mexico, Central America and South America. Air Canada is a founding member of Star Alliance, the world's most comprehensive air transportation network serving 1,300 airports in 191 countries. Air Canada is the only international network carrier in North America to receive a Four-Star ranking according to independent U.K. research firm Skytrax. For more information, please visit: www.aircanada.com, follow @AirCanada on Twitter and join Air Canada on Facebook.

Internet: aircanada.com

SOURCE Air Canada