What has been years in the planning passed in a matter of days, but how best can we describe this year’s World Routes after its debut in the USA. Well, only those immortalized words would do… ‘Viva Las Vegas’. There are few locations you will you see American showgirls from Las Vegas sharing the exhibition floor with Russian ballerinas from St Petersburg, or a space age character promoting Birmingham Airport’s curry offering to Hannover Airport’s Jägermeister hostesses.

And, all of this was taking place against a backdrop of a record number of pre-arranged meetings. It is too early to say what impact the four days of networking in the world’s entertainment capital will have, but if a conservative one per cent of the 7,900 pre-scheduled meetings results in new services, that will bring almost 80 new route pairs and a significant boost to origin and destination economies (with meetings arranged through the Extra Meetings System at the event the total number of meetings taking place is estimated to be around 16,000).

We have tried to squeeze four days of business and networking into just three minutes in our special event highlights package below: