There will be no regular flight connections at Kassel Airport in Calden in winter 2024/2025. Only a few special flights to Finland, Norway and Madeira are on offer. This means that travelers from northern Hesse have to switch to other airports. From February 2025, a weekly connection to Gran Canaria will be offered again, followed by flights to Antalya from April.
The suspension of regular connections is attributed to the "difficult market" and lengthy negotiations with airlines, as airport managing director Lars Ernst explained. Sundair, the only airline based at the airport, had already stopped flying in the summer flight schedule. Ernst also pointed to rising costs for airlines at German airports and the geopolitical situation as further burdening factors.
Since its opening in 2013, Kassel Airport has been consistently in the red. In 2023, the deficit amounted to almost five million euros. Despite a slight recovery in passenger numbers after the pandemic, the airport continues to be criticized, especially by the Green opposition in the Hessian state parliament, which denounces the high deficit and speaks of an "impending decline". The state government, on the other hand, defends the airport as an "important northern Hessian infrastructure project" and plans to further strengthen it.
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