“Booking numbers have been growing steadily for eight weeks, with a significant jump upwards last week. Those were the strongest seven days since April 2020,” executive board member Harry Hohmeister told the newspapers of the Funke Media Group.

“For flights in July and August, demand is 10 to 11 times higher than four weeks ago.” On some routes, demand is even higher than before the coronavirus pandemic, he added.

The infection figures have been falling for some time, and bookings are increasing. Lufthansa therefore plans to reactivate 30 to 50 additional aircraft in the next few weeks.

During the coronavirus pandemic, the group had mothballed hundreds of aircraft.

“We are very flexible in our planning and can quickly offer sufficient seats,” said Hohmeister. Exceptionally, Lufthansa could also fly “with a jumbo on a route with high demand with 370 passengers instead of a short-haul aircraft with 180 guests.”

At the same time, Hohmeister called on politicians to launch the digital vaccination passport by the end of June. “Otherwise, the summer travel season will be very inconvenient for customers,” he said.

The paperwork with proof of vaccination, tests or recovery from the virus must be completed as soon as possible, he said. Almost every country makes its own specifications and demands different documents. “We need an international standard, but in the short term we need uniform rules at least in Europe.”

The EU countries and the European Parliament had recently agreed on details of a Europe-wide certificate for proof of vaccination, tests and recovery from Covid-19.