Greece’s Aegean Airlines will expand its operation in former Yugoslav markets next summer with the resumption of flights suspended in 2020 due to the coronavirus pandemic and the launch of a new route. However, it will still maintain fewer frequencies to the region than it did prior to the global health emergency. The carrier will restore operations between Athens and Zagreb next summer with seasonal flights to commence on June 15. They will operate twice per week, each Wednesday and Saturday, with a mix of Airbus A320 and A320neo aircraft. The service is scheduled to last until October 8. Overall, the airline will operate 34 flights each way between the two cities next year. It will compete against Croatia Airlines, which runs seasonal operations via Dubrovnik.
Following a two-year hiatus, the Greek carrier will return to the Montenegrin market next summer. Aegean will restore two weekly flights between Athens and Podgorica on May 11, with the service to be maintained twice per week, each Wednesday and Sunday, until the end of the 2022 summer season on October 26. Flights will be operated by Aegean’s regional subsidiary Olympic Air. The carrier has filed the 72-seat ATR72 aircraft as its planned equipment on the route, although the airline still does not have the type in its fleet, utilising the ATR42 and the Dash 8 instead. Overall, a total of 49 flights are planned between the two cities for the duration of the coming summer season.
Aegean Airlines will also introduce a brand new seasonal route between Thessaloniki and Dubrovnik. The summer flights will be maintained three times per week from June 1 until the end of the summer season, although two of the three weekly services will be concluded at the end of September. The flights are scheduled to operate with the incoming ATR72 turboprops, with further details available here. It will complement the airline’s existing seasonal rotations from Athens, which will run up to four times per week next summer with the A320 and A320neo jets. The carrier has not scheduled any flights to Split next year, which were maintained up until the Covid-19 pandemic. Elsewhere in the former Yugoslavia, Aegean will switch equipment on its Skopje route to the ATR72s, while flights to Belgrade will be operated four times per week with the A320 and A320neos.
The Greek carrier told EX-YU Aviation News, "The former Yugoslav region is an important market for Aegean Airlines. Demand for these routes remain strong as passengers are able to travel to Athens and beyond. Our performance is satisfactory on this market, as is the cooperation we have with partner airlines in the region. Almost all flights from the former Yugoslav republics to Athens offer very good point to point coverage, as well as access to thirty Greek domestic destinations, connections to Cyprus and destinations in the Middle East and Southern Italy, which have proved popular with passengers from the Balkan region”.
One would think Zagreb would be able to sustain year round flights to Athens. How come there are only seasonal peak summer flights ?
ReplyDeleteTime for FR to step in. They would blow away both OU and A3.
DeleteThey cancelled year round flights because of pandemic.
DeleteNo, they cancelled them before the pandemic
DeleteHave there ever been flights from Thessaloniki and Dubrovnik?
ReplyDeleteNo, I don't believe so
DeleteNo. Never.
DeleteGreat to see them resuming flights.
ReplyDeleteKako je to autor siguran da je Zagreb "seasonal" pa to treba ponovit jedno 17 puta u članku. Prije pandemije je ruta bila year round i ako se stvari krenu vraćati u normalu naravno da će opet biti tako. Sada su popunjeni letovi za ljeto što je logično, ali nikako dovoljno da se donose takvi zaključci.
ReplyDeleteПа зато што је сезонска на основу тренутно доступних летова у систему. Зар не видиш да прекидају летове 08.10 дакле не чекају чак ни крај летњег реда летења. Очигледно да не очекују неко спектакуларно пословање у Загребу посебно сада када Рајанер уводи Солун те ће им сигурно одузети добар део путника који су преседали преко Атине.
DeleteRoute was downgraded to seasonal before covid
DeleteIt did not operate in January and February and flights end in early October compared to end of summer for others... think it's safe to say it's seasonal. No need to get angry.
"Zagreb "seasonal" pa to treba ponovit jedno 17 puta u članku."
DeleteNapisano jednom za Zagreb. Gde si ti izbrojao 17?
Anon 09.08
DeleteWhy are you so triggered by Aegean flying seasonally to Zagrab?
Linija je sezonska jer ne najavljuju letove preko zime 2022/23. Naravno to se može promijeniti.
DeleteAli Zagreb nece trajati celog leta. Pogledaj kada je poslednji let, a kada je za ostale linije. Tako da jeste sezonska.
DeleteWelcome back :)
ReplyDeleteNice addition with the SKG-DBV flights. I'm guessing these are aimed at Greeks going on holiday?
ReplyDeleteBest airline in Europe in my opinion.
ReplyDeleteThis makes Croatia Airlines' ZAG-DBV-ATH flights highly uncompetitive. Who should sit in Zagreb on a plane to go to Athens with a stop in Dubrovnik when they can fly nonstop on a better airline for less money?
ReplyDeleteThey survived first time on that route, they will survive again. Most of time their prices was cheaper than on direct flight, and layover in DBV was very short. Also, there were more passengesr from DBV to ATH than ZAG to ATH on that route.
DeleteDoes OU use Airbus or Dash on this route?
DeleteQ400!
DeleteOU should finally make ZAG-ATH year round, at least one weekly and keep the others via DBV.
DeleteHow come there is no codeshare between Croatia Airlines and Aegean? They are both Star alliance members. Makes no sense.
DeleteIt's odd especially considering they codeshare with JU on their Croatia flights.
DeleteTrue. And JU has codeshares with two Greek airlines. Aegean and Sky Express.
DeleteI think SkyExpress is only a Special Prorate Agreement, not codeshare.
DeleteCould some other routes in ex-Yu work for them from Thessaloniki as well?
ReplyDeletePerhaps Podgorica could work. JU flies double daily in summer, Ryanair is starting Zagreb and Skopje is too close.
DeleteAnd there are also Kraljevo- Thessaloniki flights :D
DeleteCome to Ljubljana!!!
ReplyDeleteSarajevo too please
DeleteI'm surprised Sarajevo didn't work out. Did they fly these with Q400s or Airbuses?
DeleteAs I remember flights were quite packed up so I don't know why did they even stop. Maybe at least sky express could come with their a320 or vollotea.
DeleteMaribor as well.
DeleteThey flew Maribor charters right?
DeleteThey should retry Ljubljana now that Adria is no longer around.
Delete10.000 indirect passengers on LJU-ATH is more than enough for a route to start.
DeleteI don't get SarJevo termination especially since they planned to increase frequencies from 2 to 4 last summer.
DeleteIf they planned to double frequencies obviously it was working but Corona and travel bans changed all that
DeleteWizz Air can now start it if there is sufficient demand.
DeleteEhen they get more neos, they could switch some q400 to a320 on other routes, and put q400 to LJU. 3x or 4x p/w with q400 would work
Delete*when
DeleteATH-LJU should be a fun ride on the Q400... not.
DeleteBetter something than nothing.
DeleteDo they have any plans to retire those Dash planes?
DeleteNo, they need them for many island destinations.
DeleteWhy? They are great for a huge number of domestic routes and are very useful right now with the pandemic. Plus A3's Dash are not that old.
DeleteGood to see they are operating more and more neos to the region.
ReplyDeleteStrange that Split is not coming back
ReplyDeleteTrue that. They used to have a lot of frequencies on that route :(
DeleteI wonder who were the passengers on the Split flights for Aegean. Were these Greeks, Croatians?
DeleteBoth
DeleteTransfers from Israel and the Middle East too.
DeleteInteresting. Thanks
DeleteI really do not understand logic of airlines on that route. For 2020. Aegean was planing to operate 4pw with A319, an upgrade from 5pw with q400. Volotea was planing 2pw with A319, OU 1pw with a319 and i think even easyjet was having flights. Now, we only have Volotea for 2022. Whats even crazier is that Aegean is not even having SPU in their system! Not even codeshare with any airline towards SPU. While OU decided to leave the route despite it was succesful and move to PRG.
DeleteAegean and Volotea started extensive cooperation and codeshare.
Deletehttps://news.gtp.gr/2021/07/07/aegean-and-volotea-sign-code-share-agreement/
Let's hope the dates stick this time. This summer they delayed the start of many routes for months.
ReplyDeleteThis summer we had a pandemic.
DeleteBravo Hrvatska!
ReplyDeleteList of terminated destination by A3 in our region is getting long: Split, Zadar, Ljubljana, Sarajevo...
ReplyDeleteI'm pretty sure Split will come back sooner or later.
DeleteAnd LJU.
DeleteAt least they aren't afraid to test out routes and see what works
DeleteZAD wad cancelled after just one season, SPU was added the following year.
DeleteSlovenes travel to Greece a lot, only reason Aegean didn't do well in Ljubljana was perhaps high prices.
DeleteMost of the people from Slovenia travel to Greece with charters, which there are plenty during summer. And the younger population (millenials) flies from VCE with LCCs to various islands. There just isn't enough people left for a LJU-Greece flight.
DeleteThere is demand for LJU-ATH.
DeleteWhy isn't Aegean flying there anymore?
DeletePolitics I guess
DeleteWhat politics would prevent a direct LJU-ATH flight but would allow dozens of charters every week?
DeleteWhat political issues exist between Slovenia and Greece?
Belgrade is their only truly successful destination in the region.
ReplyDeleteTheir Skopje flights are doing quite well. It was the first route they resumed in ex-Yu during covid.
DeleteYes but in BEG they have flights from ATH, RHO and HER, the two last ones being seasonal. ATH-BEG is operated 5 times per week with A320/321.
DeleteAnd what about DBV? It is also succesful route.
DeleteBy region i assume you mean ex-yu? They fly 8x weekly to SOF and 10x weekly to TIA + seasonal HER, RHO, SKG.
DeleteYes mate, we are on an ex-JU aviation newsblog.
DeleteIn that case, i do agree BEG is definitely the most successful for Aegean in ex-yu. When you say ''region'' some people might have different perceptions.
DeleteHighly doubt anyone includes Bulgaria and Romania when talking about a region that includes Serbia.
DeleteRight, how could anyone do that? Definitely not like they are right next to each other.
DeleteTrue but this is an ex YU blog not a Balkan one.
DeleteI am very well aware of that. But when someone says ''region'' it does not neccessarily mean they are refering to ex-yu exclusively. People are not robots. Airports like BUD, SOF, TIA, OTP are always mentioned here, so what...
DeleteThey should try seasonal flights to Banja Luka.
ReplyDeleteIt would make sense since JU operated BNX ATH
DeleteThey can try direct flights during summer from BNX to any Greek destination and it would work out for sure.
DeleteThey need to open SKG -BNX summer route 2pw
DeleteLove you Aegean! Thanks!
ReplyDeleteThe SKP route is not developing as planned I think, I was hoping for daily flights for the next summer, or/and some flights operating with A319/320 family...
ReplyDeleteHow many weekly flights they plan next summer?
DeleteSame! Their prices are ridiculously high for a 1 hour flight! I was looking to fly to SKP through ATH on different itineraries from AUS, and a ticket it’s 23kg luggage is 140 euro! I was also hoping for an upgrade from a Q400 to a 319, not a flipping ATR72
DeleteDoes anyone know the load factor from SKP and TIA! Cause I’m surprised that they fly there daily if not twice with a a320-neo-319!
DeleteExcellent news. Well done Aegean!
ReplyDeleteWill they operate charters from Greek islands to Belgrade like they did this summer?
ReplyDeleteIt's way too early to know that. Depends if tour operators need them.
DeleteI hope that they will start some scheduled flights to Greek islands from BEG and also Thessaloniki, not just charter. OK now it is more difficult since Wizz entered the market, but I think that there are space. Aegean has a lot transfers via Athens to islands from Beg.
DeleteMaybe in 2023 they could introduce Athens-Pula seasonal?
ReplyDelete"Southern Italy, which have proved popular with passengers from the Balkan region. "
ReplyDeleteNow that's interesting. Wonder which countries from the Balkans?
We saw there is quite some demand in Italy from Serbia
Deletehttps://www.exyuaviation.com/2021/10/italian-national-airline-to-launch.html
The Greek airline Sky Express is expanding more and more into Europe. I hope they start some flights to ex-Yu countries and provide some competition to Aegean.
ReplyDeleteThey would be a good addition. Hopes so. They cooperate with JU.
DeleteJust another attack on Air Serbia's transfer business. It does not seem that ASL has any good anwer to this.
ReplyDelete??
DeleteWhy is LJU ditched again? Greece is the most visited country un rhe Balkans and literally connected with all European capitals. I don't get it.
ReplyDelete