A taxpayer-funded subsidy of up to $9M to offset any losses sustained by Aer Lingus in its first 2 years of operation at Bradley was among the incentives agreed upon in 2016 to bring the airline to Connecticut.

Aer Lingus drew half of that amount at the end of Year 1.

Advance bookings for spring/summer 2018 are said to be "encouraging," but low winter bookings continue to be problematic.

Aer Lingus is currently (1 March 2018) running 3 round trips/week, but plans to up that to 4/week later in the month, then to daily for April-October.

Aer Lingus "hopes" to promote leisure travel on the route this summer.

If they're going to do that, they've made a late start. And hope is not a strategy.