NEWS FLASH
Air Serbia has scheduled the resumption of its flights between Belgrade and Cairo after three years. Flights between the two capitals will be launched on May 15. The service will run three times per week, each Monday, Wednesday and Friday departing Belgrade, and each Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday leaving Cairo. “By listening to the needs of passengers in Serbia, as well as the broader Balkan region, we have decided to introduce scheduled nonstop flights between Belgrade and Cairo. Our company has been operating services to the capital of Egypt since the summer of 2019, and we are glad that we now have the opportunity to reconnect the two friendly countries”, Air Serbia’s General Manager for Commercial and Strategy, Boško Rupić, said. Air Serbia faces no direct competition on the route. Egypt Air maintains a codeshare partnership with Aegean Airlines between Athens and Belgrade, while its subsidiary Air Cairo runs scheduled year-round flights between Hurghada and Belgrade. As reported yesterday, the Serbian carrier is expected to announce another two new routes for its network over the coming period. Further flight details for the Belgrade - Cairo flights can be viewed here.
Departure time from BEG is too early for connecting passengers from Europe though...
ReplyDeleteExactly! What were the guys from Network thinking? They should have scheduled it for later. BEG limitations and fleet capacity aside, but this is not the first oversight courtesy of JU's Network team. Hope they correct it somehow in future.
DeleteThat is why 3 weekly is not enough, they had to have at least 5 or 6 weekly. 3 departures at 23.10 and 2/3 later, around 00.30.
DeleteAnd if they scheduled it for later how exactly do you think they would have connected onto any departing flight from Belgrade in the morning?
DeleteThat is why they shoudl have made a similar schedule like for AMM and ROV
Delete@11.25
DeleteNo, they should have flown 20 times per week. Some of you people think that there is unlimited demand, unlimited planes and no competition whatsoever. At the same time they are looking to make money, not burn it. Give the airline to one of you to run for a day, they would declare bankruptcy within a week.
Arrival time 5:55/06:00 at BEG is also too late for certain connections. Split schedule is the only solution. If they want as many transfers from the Middle East as possible, they need to fix that schedule...
DeleteWell are you saying that returning to Budapest with 17 weekly make more sense than having daily fights to Cairo? Odd reasoning.
DeleteWhat kind of split schedule? Can you please provide example?
Delete@11.46
DeleteYes, because the costs of flying daily to Cairo are higher than the costs of flying 17 weekly to Budapest.
Costs mean little if you can't get people to book flights with you. Also Egypt is a much larger market than Hungary.
DeleteTalking of BUD, I hope they will load the fares to Cairo as you can't book BUD-BEG-CAI right now
DeleteSplit schedule, means crew stays over at a hotel at destination for 4-6hrs and departs. But that means BEG-CAI flight has to depart say at 7or 8pm, lands 10pm, crew sleeps for 4-5hr and flught back lands at 5am in Belgrade.
DeleteThat is not what a split schedule means.
DeleteThe person suggesting daily flights to Cairo is completely detached from reality and shows real lack of knowledge about demand, costs, yields, scheduling, crew requirements or competition.
DeleteSerbia-Hungary trade: ~$3 billion.
DeleteSerbia-Egypt trade: $80 million.
JU needs the frequencies to BUD to accommodate the business sector which is huge. Hungary is one of the largest trade partners of Serbia. The short distancs between the 2 cities means that JU has to go in it with frequencies to be competitive. It's a completely different approach with CAI.
@11,33
Check my comment below. Later departure makes it worse for connections. Split schedules doesn't help either. This schedule currently is the best that can be done.
@12:34
DeleteThats is not a split schedule. Split schedule is schedule where some flights depard in one departure bank and some in another one. For example, Skoplje has departures in both night wave and midday wave, such maximasing possible connections. That is split schedule. Such is not applicable to Cairo route since the rotation is way too long. Split schedule for Cairo would require a departure that wouldn’t connect to more than 5 routes. This is the best option right now.
My mistake, I understood split duty for crew, not split departure times.
Delete@12,34
DeleteLayovers of 4-6 hours is not legal under any aviation laws. BEG-CAI minimum layover time would 12 hours if they were to layover crew in Cairo. Thousands have died in crew fatigue related accidents in aviation which is why these rules are put in place. Night operations is where crew legalities are at their smallest as it is when the body is naturally at it's lowest state of alertness. You really wouldn't want to be on a flight with fatigued crew so that the airline can fit flights into their arrival and departure banks.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_India_Express_Flight_812
@12,34
DeleteLayovers of 4-6 hours is not legal under any aviation laws. Thousands dead from fatigue related accidents in aviation is why laws are put in place. Minimum layover time for BEG-CAI would be 12 hours, if JU was to ever layover it's crew in Cairo. Night operations also see the smallest duty times for crew as it is when the body is naturally at it's lowest state of alertness. You really don't want to be on a flight with fatigued crew just because the airline is trying to make their schedules work.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_India_Express_Flight_812
"Splits (Split duty) are when a break in suitable accommodation is provided to a crew member during a flight duty period (FDP) that allows the maximum FDP to be exceeded".
DeleteThey are NOT layovers, but rest periods in a hotel provided in order to extend the duty period. Call then however you want, but they are legal, even though I hate them personally, but it hate the "red eye" turns even more so. Splits at least give crews rest during perids from 2-4am.
And JU has exclusively "Red eye" turns on all their night flight, regardless if it is Airbus or ATR operated flights.... It's just brutal and so fatiguing on crew members.
DeleteWell, JU is not the only one which does that. Middle Eastern destinations all have middle of the night departures to Europe. Most if not all of them are operated with the same crew. Just look at arrivals and departures at places like LCA, BEY,TLV, CAI, AMM...
DeleteWhat JU does is nothing out of the ordinary. Not to mention that JU crew sits in lounges at airports where the layover is a bit longer. It's not like they have to sit inside the ATR on the dark tarmac.
Sorry, but you are wrong about that.. Ask around:(
DeleteSo with that departure JU will not be able to offer the following connections to Cairo:
ReplyDelete23.45 CPH
23.35 LED
23.00 BCN
23.00 DUS
22.55 CDG
22.50 HAJ
To Cairo they will offer the following:
Zurich
Venice
Frankfurt
Rome
Vienna
Stuttgart
Ljubljana
Moscow
Zagreb
Podgorica
Berlin
Prague
Bologna
Milan
In the other direction they will offer connections to all of Europe. Not very promising.
"In the other direction they will offer connections to all of Europe. Not very promising."
DeleteLOL
So the flight can't connect on a grand total of six routes and you have decided it will fail. Thankfully you are an armchair CEO.
DeleteI think the more attractive departure times would be 00:20 and 10:20 depending on the days. They would cover many other destinations and offer more connections.
DeleteWell yes because markets like SVO and CDG are not important.
DeleteConnect onto SVO for what? Their SVO plans are packed with point to point traffic, and transfers to Europe where they have almost 0 competition and that pay significantly more then connecting passengers to Cairo would. Why would they fill the plane to SVO with connecting passengers flying with low fares when they can fill it with high paying customers. And in the process why would they compete with all the Russian airlines flying to Egypt?
DeleteWell we will see how this route will perform. Last time they flew they had horrible loads once summer passed. I don't expect them to do any better now. Hopefully they stick to seasonal flying.
DeleteCPH, OSL, VLC and GOT are pretty much the only destinations where connections don't work for both sides of transit. Out of 80+ routes, it isn't that bad. We can't always expect to have 100% of the routes covered.
DeleteCAI, if I remember right, had a lot of transfers for Italy (MXP). The largest amount of Egyptian diaspora in Europe by far is in Italy, and JU has that covered on 4 destinations (FCO, MXP, VCE, BLQ). The route also wasn't purely transit traffic either.
JU also planned to introduce a 4 pm CDG departure which would of facilitated connections onto CAI. CDG will at some point need to go more than 14 pw.
@11,37
Delete00,20 departure would arrive back at 07,00 and miss the entire JU departure bank with VIE being the only destination possible with a short connection.
10,20 departure would have the aircraft back at 17,00. No transfers on departure without at least 5 hours of transit from the Balkan wave, and arrival misses quite a number of destinations such as CDG, CPH, BLQ, PRG, making it worse than the current schedules.
This schedule is simply the best that can be done at the moment.
Okay my bad, then 09.20 departure instead of 10.20 would be a nice addition to the afternoon transfer wave. Long haul passengers from JFK and ORD could also transfer to CAI at 09.20
Delete@15,11
DeleteIn that case, ORD would work once a week (Wednesday), JFK twice (Monday and Wednesday). 09,20 departure misses the entire Western European network for the outbound sector.
Absolutely no seasonal. During the winter two flights. Cairo is as prestige as an important, which in future will gather more and more passangers for YU.
DeleteThe problem is that aircraft must return by 6am for the morning flights. Having that in mind, this was the only option for such service. They can reschedule some western European routes so they can connect onto CAI service.
ReplyDeleteFor those saying that BEG departure should be around 10:20 in the morning, have in mind that they already have couple departures and that they dont have planes for such departure bank, because aircraft return from western Europe around midday.
So that leads us again to the main problem in Air Serbia. They want to grow over night, but don't have even close enough planes.
DeleteYou think they will reschedule western European flights to accommodate a single route? Do you people think Cairo is the most important route in their network?
DeleteNo, I meant if the flight misses connection because it’s late arrival by 5-10 mins, they can reschudule it a bit. Thats not a big deal.
DeleteMoreover, as far as I know, CDG was about to get third daily flight back in 2020 with afternoon departure. If that happens, CDG will connect perfectly onto Cairo route. At some point JU will introduce that flight because CDG is one of their strongest route.
Last tume the had a lot of transfer from milan and italy and insee thy can connect from many cities in italy so i think it will be okay
DeleteMissing CDG is not okay
ReplyDeleteThey offer CAI-BEG-CDG and such route is cheaper than both EgyptAir and AirFrance.
DeleteSo now they only need additional 3 ATRs, 3 A319 and 5 A320 to be able to even fly those new routes
ReplyDeleteThat’s the same I was thinking. They have to double their fleet to make it happen. Can they do it?
DeleteThey will have 8 ATR’s by summer. They already have 5 -600 series. On top of that comes YR-ACA in wet-lease and two -600 series that they are negotiating lease with lessors.
DeleteI agree with the rest regarding the schedule. Not very convenient for sure similar to the Madrid one, which is also not very good. Usually CAI-BEG-CDG, ZRH and LHR should have good connections. Also lets not forget that CAI is a very competitive market as A3, LO, TK, RO also have good prices. Perhaps the CAI route will be used by Russians as well as BEG is the only possible alternative in the region for them.
ReplyDeleteImaju brdo letova preko IST. Tako da bas da je konkurentan…
DeleteRussia has direct flights to Egypt why take a stop over ?
DeleteBecause the price might suit them more or the flight times and so on. Just because there are nonstop flights between two cities doesn't mean people stopped using connecting flights. Do you think JU's BEG-JFK took over all of the O&D market and that no one flies via MUC, FRA or AMS anymore?
DeleteWhich fleet should service all those new routes?Do they plan to wet lease 6 A320?:))))))
ReplyDeleteTheir own planes are stucked in JAT Tehnika,but even with those planes operative they cannot service such a network.It is simply not possible.
New planes are not being dry leased,and even if they would start looking for them now,perhaps they would come till end of August.
As a Serb,I'm really proud of Air Serbia,but this uncotrolled growth could potentially ruin them
3/12 Airbus narrowbodies are at Jat Tehnika:
Delete- APA since 26.12
- APB since 14.09
- APD since 30.01
1/12 Airbus narrowbodies is at Turkish Technic in Istanbul:
- APK since 09.01
3 A319's currently on C check, which takes roughly 3-4 weeks to complete. APB was mentioned may have some extra complications, which is why it is out of service for so long (possible corrosion?). They also mentioned back at Farnborough that they are looking at adjusting the Airbus narrowbody fleet configurations (extra seats).
https://tangosix.rs/2022/08/08/ekskluzivno-direktor-er-srbije-jirzi-marek-povecavamo-broj-sedista-u-kabinama-razmatramo-erbasov-softver-za-optimizaciju-prilaza-u-buducnosti-planiramo-da-nasi-atr-ovi-dobiju-biznis-klasu-i-lete/
Something will be coming from the branding side of things this year :)
JU has been in talks with suppliers for aircraft for several months. For all we know they could be in final preparations for another A320 delivery. I don't think that more than 2 will arrive this summer. 2 more ATR's are confirmed to be joining.
Zar zaista mislite da ljudi iz JU menadžmenta nisu seli i stvili na papir broj ruta i raspored letenja istih i broj aviona koji je potreban? Ovakve sumnje nikako ne mogu nazvati zabrinutim već zlonamernim.
DeleteAPD je operativan. Leteo je juce za CDG.
DeleteI think that the biggest transfer market on CAI-BEG route is actually Italy, not France.
ReplyDeleteI remember just before Covid outbreak when JU increased frequencies to MXP and FCO after Alitalia reduced operations and it was mentioned how important the transer market from Egypt to Italy was.
Indeed, MXP-BEG used to have 20 to 25 transfers to Cairo. Once these loads started to pick up competition started to undercut them, especially Aegean. A few of them really lowered their fares from Milan to Cairo which led to lower loads on JU. It also didn't help that back then JU had problems with delays so many connections would be missed and so on.
DeleteOnce winter came and when JU butchered their network, BEG-CAI-BEG would operate with 30 to 50 passengers per flight.
This winter their network is much better so let's hope they have more luck in winter 2023/2024.
It's a shame they don't have more planes but they could have introduced a morning flight at around 10.00 similar to what they have to LCA. LCA-BEG that arrives at around 16.00 is constantly full. Same could happen with CAI-BEG.
Flight with a 10.00 departure could offer connections from the night arrivals as well as those regional ones that leave at around 06/07.
Good luck in turning around that plane in CAI within 45 minutes on the ground. This is crazy planning and wishful thinking. Delays will be massive to start from Belgrade and there is a real chance that these CAI flights will be often disturbing the morning wave out of Belgrade.
ReplyDelete+1
DeleteThey had exactly the same turnaround times in 2019 and there were no issues. The flight time is published as longer than it actually is.
DeleteGood luck to both JU and BEG. anyone know how many midnight departures the airport will have when summer comes? I mean on the busiest night.
ReplyDeleteFrom the top of my head:
1. DXB
2. SOF
3. OTP
4. IST
5. SKG
6. ATH
7. TIA
8. SKP
9. LCA
10. CAI
11. AER
Don't know if KWI, OHD... will operate on the same day as these.
Verovatno i SJJ.
DeleteIf they add a night flight to SJJ and they most likely will, then connectivity over there will be much better. They are finally going to be competitive to JFK.
DeleteThey could also offer IST flights.
Ne samo za JFK nego i za ORD.
DeleteBravo Air Serbia 🇷🇸🇷🇸🇷🇸
ReplyDeleteThis Cairo move by JU is excellent. As I anticipated Cairo will become raising Airport Hub for Arab countries in the next 10 years. Also trans-atlantic connection to Cairo via Belgrade will become competitive. After last summer disaster with delays, cancellations and lost baggage lots of Ex-YU passengers would gladly avoid Heathrow and Schiphol connections.
ReplyDeleteAgree 100%
DeleteI am almost positive that we will have chaos in Belgrade this summer.
DeleteIt would be out of Serbian character to always think and expect the worse.
DeleteNext is Lisabon or Tel Aviv?
ReplyDeleteTel Aviv yes.
DeleteWhy is JU so expensive on this route, it is around 42000 RSD for a return ticket in May. I found Austrian, return ticket in May, 38000-40000 RSD, Belgrade-Vienna-Cairo.
ReplyDelete