Wow! Turkish Airlines Cancels All International Flights Except to 5 Cities - Running with Miles

In a major move for the airline that flies to more countries than anyone else, Turkish Airline is canceling all international flights except to 5 cities.

Emirates just announced the cancelation of all flights and now Turkish Airlines is the next one. I had written how they had canceled flights to over 100 countries already but, as reader Ed pointed out, Turkish is now canceling all their international flights - except to 5 cities.

Turkish Airlines Cancels All International Flights - Except to 5 Cities

As of March 27, Turkish Airlines will be grounding all their international flights except to the following cities - Hong Kong, Moscow, Ethiopia, New York and Washington, D.C. This is big for the airline that flies to more countries than any other airline in the world and they are only keeping those cities to facilitate transfers.

The chairman said there will be no layoffs ( Turkey itself owns 49% of Turkish Airlines) and had a rather unusual incentive laid out - which I find hard to believe. The Daily Sabah says this:

I can only imagine that it is only for people who have their final destination as Turkey so it may be a way to keep Turkish citizens away for now. I cannot believe they will give every passenger this as it would be an insane amount of miles. Our family had a big trip planned in a couple of weeks that would result in 470,000 Turkish miles. 🙂 Sure, we'll postpone that. 🙂

Check this post for information about canceling your trip or finding information about it. This post will be updated with resume dates on flights to various countries so keep track of this one, too.