Holidaymakers will face higher air fares this summer because of capacity constraints, the boss of Ryanair has warned.
Chief executive Michael O'Leary said issues limiting the number of available aircraft mean European airlines will struggle to meet demand for travel during the peak season.
He predicted that Ryanair's ticket prices will be up to 10% more expensive this summer compared with the same period last year.
The no-frills carrier operates in Scotland from Edinburgh, Glasgow, Aberdeen and Prestwick airports to dozens of popular holiday and city break destinations across Europe, including Barcelona, Copenhagen, Dublin, Corfu, Alicante, Brussels, Ibiza, Lisbon, Madrid, Vienna and Rome.
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Mr O'Leary said fares will have to rise to offset lower than expected growth in passenger numbers for the airline as a result of delays in the delivery of new planes manufactured by Boeing.
Ryanair's original forecast for the year to the end of March 2025 was that it would carry 205 million passengers, up from 183.5 million during the previous 12 months.
Speaking to reporters at Ryanair's Dublin headquarters, Mr O'Leary said: "With less aircraft, maybe we'll have to bring that 205 million down towards 200 million passengers.
"It might be a scratch below 200 million, we just don't know at this stage.
"That probably means that even our growth this year is going to be constrained in Europe, and I think that leads to a higher fare environment across Europe for summer 2024."
The warning comes after a surge in air fares in summer 2023 which was driven by the higher cost of jet fuel.
Mr O'Leary said he expected increases in summer 2024 to be more modest.
He said: "Fares in summer 2024 are going to be up again on summer 2023.
"Our average air fares in summer 2023 rose 17%.
"We don't think we'll see that kind of double-digit fare increase this year.
"We're doing our budgets based on a fare increase of 5-10%, which to me feels kind of reasonable.
"It could be higher than that, it could be lower than that, we don't really know.
"If capacity was growing, I think fares would be falling."
Ryanair has a contract with Boeing for the delivery of 57 new planes by the end of March next year but he expects to only receive 40 to 45 by then.
Mr O'Leary said the US manufacturer "has the Federal Aviation Administration (the US regulator) crawling all over them" since a Boeing 737 Max 9 operated by Alaska Airlines suffered a mid-air blowout on January 5.
Shocking photos revealed a gaping hole in the side of the aircraft after a window and chunk of fuselage blew off shortly after take-off from the US state of Oregon, causing the cabin to suddenly depressurise.
Following the incident, major concerns have been raised about quality control for new Boeing aircraft, sparking a limit in production speed.
Meanwhile, it was announced in July last year than more than 1,000 Pratt & Whitney-built engines would need to be removed from Airbus aircraft due to a safety recall.
Mr O'Leary predicted that airlines such as Wizz Air, Lufthansa and Air France "will be grounding upwards of 20% of their A320 fleets" because of this.
He added: "If we could get all 57 aircraft deliveries from Boeing in advance before the end of June we would make out like bandits all summer long because we have airports at the moment beating the door down to us."
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