Adria to take over Darwin Saabs

Adria Airways plans to take over Saab 2000 regional tubroprops from its former subsidiary Darwin Airline, which declared bankruptcy in December of last year. The fifty-seat aircraft are expected to re-enter Adria's fleet at the start of the 2018 summer season in March. It ends several months of uncertainty whether the turboprops, which have been grounded since Darwin's demise, would be taken over by the Slovenian carrier. Adria has based its expansion plans out of Ljubljana this summer on the utilisation of the aircraft, which are scheduled to operate all six of its new routes, as well as a select number of other cities. The majority of the Saabs have been sitting on the tarmac at Ljubljana Airport for the past few weeks. As previously reported, Adria also plans to lease additional Bombardier CRJ900 capacity, with two of its own Bombardiers to be wet-leased to other carriers over the summer.

Adria took over some of Darwin Airline's Saabs, which were operating under the brand name Adria Airways Switzerland, during the last two quarters of 2017. They were deployed on regional routes from Ljubljana to Podgorica, Prague, Pristina, Sarajevo, Skopje, Tirana and Vienna. In an interview to the "Aero Telegraph" portal in October of last year, Adria's CEO, Arno Schuster, noted, "Our fleet now ranges from the 140-seat A319 to the 50-seat Saab 2000. We are thus much more flexible. We now have the right aircraft for every situation. Likewise, we can do better in the wet-lease market because we now have a suitable aircraft for every need".

Slovenia's national airline yesterday reported it carried more than 1.2 million passengers in 2017, representing an increase of 10% on the year before. From its second base in Pristina, the airline handled 177.166 travellers, which is similar to 2016's figure. It retained its position as the fourth busiest airline in the city. Its network-wide passenger growth came as result of the introduction of additional frequencies on existing services and the launch of flights between Ljubljana and Kiev. Mr Schuster noted that 2017 was key for the carrier as it improved frequencies and reduced its minimum connecting time at Ljubljana Airport. Adria handled a record 1.740.000 passengers with an average cabin load factor of 80% in 1987, which was the busiest year for aviation in the former Yugoslavia. It has been unable to surpass the figure since. The airline is yet to release its financial results.