MICHAEL O'LEARY says he believes summer holidays to Europe will go ahead this year, in spite of the Covid-19 crisis.
The Ryanair chief said that once Covid-19 vaccines are successfully rolled out across the continent, trips abroad will be given the green light.
He suggested there might still be a "few restrictions," in place for international travellers, but after last year's summer plans were torn to pieces for most of us, I think we can chalk that one up as a win.
Speaking to BBC Radio 4's Today programme on Monday, O'Leary said: "We are taking significant bookings from people booking holidays this summer.
"There is a huge upward spike at the end of the third wave. I think the vaccine is the solution to this."
He said that Easter was probably too early a time to expect trips abroad to return, but went on to predict: "Certainly by the summer, by the time we get to the school holidays, we'll see few restrictions across Europe because of the roll-out of these vaccines."
Mr O'Leary questioned why governments would seek to restrict movements of people after all the high-risk groups, such as those in nursing homes, are vaccinated.
The Ryanair boss has long-since been critical of the restrictions imposed on the airline industry, particularly those imposed in Ireland.
At one point, he threatened to remove all Ryanair operations from Dublin and Cork's airports unless Ireland dropped their 'green list' system, which identified which countries were safe to travel to during the height of the pandemic last summer.
