Low cost carrier Ryanair is continuing to downsize its destination network from the former Yugoslavia with plans to discontinue flights from Banja Luka to three cities over the 2023/24 winter season, which begins on October 29 and runs until March 30. The carrier will end operations out of Bosnia and Herzegovina’s second largest city to Charleroi and Nuremberg from November 5, as well as Berlin from November 6. Based on its existing plans, Charleroi will be restored from March 15, while the two German destinations have been discontinued indefinitely at this point. As a result, the carrier will boast four routes from Banja Luka for most of the winter season - Vienna, Memmingen, Stockholm and Gothenburg.
The development comes after Ryanair discontinued its operations between Banja Luka and Bergamo in January. This summer, the carrier also discontinued flights from Tuzla following a spat over state taxes. The budget airline has also announced plans to discontinue three routes out of its Zagreb base this winter, as well as another three routes from Podgorica. This week, Wizz Air suspended its service between Banja Luka and Stockholm Skavsta, while flights between Bosnia and Herzegovina’s second largest city and Hamburg will be halted from October 28. Wizz Air will maintain operations from Banja Luka to Basel and Dortmund this coming winter.
Banja Luka Airport handled 281.766 passengers between January and July, marking its best ever result for the seventh-month period and up 64.6% on last year’s record. The airport’s General Manager, Natalija Trivić, recently said Banja Luka is preparing for the 2024 summer season and is in discussions with Turkish Airlines over the introduction of flights from Istanbul. “We will also try to establish scheduled flights to Athens from the spring and we are negotiating charter flights to Cyprus, as well as another Mediterranean destination such as Barcelona to be operated by one of our low cost partners”, Ms Trivić noted. She added, “We are also in discussions for the current two weekly flights to Belgrade to be increased to at least three weekly and for the schedule to be improved”.
Sadly 😥
ReplyDeleteTIA CALLING RYANAIR FROM 31 OCT
Deleteanother dumb post. Ryanair doesnt intend to fly from BER nor from NUE to TIA
DeleteIt was good while it lasted
ReplyDeleteWinter is coming!
DeleteWhat's going on with LCCs in Bosnia?
ReplyDeleteCorruption?
DeleteCorruption with what exactly?
DeleteWith the country unable to attract any airline to settle permanently.
DeleteBNX is the only airport that is developing and it is really sad that routes like BER, BRU cannot be maintained….
It's just that people in this country are used to catching OS, OU, TK and traveling 10 hours to cities that are 1 hour away from B&H!!!!
It has more to do with the overall state of the market and demand, rather than corruption.
Delete"POZDRAV" is very correct. Through FRA is best.
Delete@Anon 09:25
DeleteBNX has no flights to FRA.
What is the reason? They have passengers, good load factor? Is this the next Wizz?
ReplyDeleteIt has to do that in winter they can make more money on other markets and with delays in aircraft deliveries they move around aircraft to those markets where they will make the most money. Same with Wizz Air.
DeleteB&H is needed for flag carrier
DeleteIt had 2 or 3 and all failed.
DeleteSo if I open now a Bosnian airline, you would add me on the list there. But am I competent and do I have necessary state support for this? Probably not. Were theu competent and had state behind? Wouldn't say so. But still their presence in the past doesn't proof Bosnia can't have one.
DeleteBerlin is very expensive airport and Ryanair is downsizing it's activity there.
DeleteFR is as W6...
ReplyDeleteVery interesting but and sadness...
ReplyDeleteWhat is the reasons? Low LF?
Not low LF, they can just make more money on another market, especially during winter time.
DeleteLow yield
Delete@09.08 and even more in summer
DeleteI listened to this lady CEO from Banja Luka the other day on TV (by chance) and I was pleasantly surprised. I know she is not from the aviation industry (which is why I was so surprised) but she either prepared really well or she has learnt a lot because she was very eloquent and it was obvious that she knew what she was talking about. She actually explained that they are in contact with Wizz and Ryan and that something like this could happen in winter, that they are preparing for next summer and basically what it says in the last part of this article.
ReplyDeleteHa I got the same impression too! She looked like she knows what she is doing and sounded more professional than many CEOs in this region.
DeleteBNX CEO is very professional. She has in fact announced cancellation of these flights during int6on RTRS.
DeleteHow many passengers could Banja Luka have this year?
ReplyDeleteAround half a million
DeleteThat would be impressive for an airport like Banja Luka.
Delete@9.17 dream on
DeleteDream on what? They've had around 350k so far. 4 months left to fill the gap
Deletehey had 281,766 til July. with 6 routes only they will barely have 18 thousand passengers in winter per month
DeleteWizz Air should respond
ReplyDeleteTako što će i on još koju liniju da otkaže?
Deletelol
DeleteThey will respond by cutting even more flights.
DeleteWizz fly to Bnx with A321
DeleteI'm curious about LF on Ryanair's flights from BNX. Anybody?
ReplyDeleteVery good 90-100%.
Delete@9.22 haha yes why not
Delete???
Deletearound 110% with overbooking.
DeleteI was today on a flight BNX to FMM. That's a daily flight, 7 per week and LF was surprisingly good, around 90%. Do you know another carrier that flies daily to Memmingen daily?
Deleteyes Wizzair
Deletethey are going down to two weekly in winter
DeleteFrom the region, who flies daily to Memmingen, and from where
DeleteWhen was the last time Ryanair launched a new route to Banja Luka? I think it has been ages.
ReplyDeleteI believe Nuremberg in 2021.
DeleteIt was a while ago but up until now they haven't discontinued a lot of them. The only two they got rid of up until now was Hahn (related to base there) and Bergamo. So this is a hit.
DeleteThank goodness Vienna will stay
ReplyDeleteWhen i wrote "Their german routes perform under average compared to the rest of ExYu. For example NUE had a LF of 78% in June (combined numbers for TZL and BNX). " you called me a liar. https://www.exyuaviation.com/2023/08/wizz-air-further-cuts-bosnia-and.html
ReplyDeleteMany markets are underperforming from/to Germany and it likely has to do with the current state of the German market. Germany still isn't even close to pre-Covid level traffic. In fact it is one of the slowest recovering markets in Europe. This winter they will only be at 80% of 2019 traffic. Only 5 countries will be worse than that.
DeleteWhat are these countries? Slovenia, Belarus, Moldova?
DeleteBelarus, Moldova, Czechia, Finland and Sweden. Slovenia has better numbers because there was no Adria in winter in 2019.
Delete@9.28 it is true. You only have to look at passenger numbers at German airports and see how slow they are recovering.
DeleteWhat is the reason for this slow recovery in Germany?
Deletebut yugo gastarbeiter routes have nothing to do with average german routes
DeleteMaybe they do if this slow recovery is related to the economy, cost of living and people spending less on flights.
Deletethat why BER is updated to daily at some other exyu markets
DeleteWell if you don't believe me that the German market is nowhere near recovery you can easily check the numbers yourself.
Deletesince many are trying to find an excuse for this in the apparently slow german recovery let me correct what i wrote if it wasnt clear enough:
Delete"Their german routes FROM BiH perform under average compared to the rest of ExY"
"apparently slow german recovery"
DeleteIt is not a myth. Check the numbers yourself or do some research online.
YES YES YES but it doesnt matter to exyu gasto routes. How many times should one repeat that?? German routes are upgraded at both BEG and SKP. Even INI and OHD have some FMM upgrade
DeleteThe German economy struggles because there is not enough working force. But if you work in Germany you still have a good living standard. From what I know the Ex yugo diaspora is stable. Bosnia shouldn't have more than 2 airports. I know it's not gonna be easy becasue it's gonna be between Tuzla and Banja Luka. And the Serbs in Banja Luka are defenitly not wanna give up their airport, neither the Bosniaks in Tuzla. But it's very important, because W6 and Raynair want strong bases.
DeleteW6 and Raynair doesn't leave Bosnia because demand is that bad(not great either but sufficient enough) but becasue they can use these planes at better places where they can make more money. If you ask me it's best that Tuzla close and Banja Luka stays open because Banja Luka is more central located than Tuzla.
If you look at W6 in Skopje you have 5(or 6 idk) planes. 4 of these planes do 3 rotations a day and 1 planes does 2 rotations a day. So W6 planes in SKP make constant money and are really efficient scheduled. In the past you saw that W6 announced in SKP 3 or 4 new routes at the same time. They did that because they don't want a plane that flies once a day. So before they deliver a new plane you need atleast 3 new routes or 2 routes but both with atleast 3-4 frequencies a week so that that plane can do 3 rotations a day.(In the prime 2019 years W6 and Raynair had probably togheter more planes based in Bosnia than in SKP but served in Bosnia togheter less passengers than SKP)
In Bosnia on the otherhand you have 3 airport. And both W6 and Raynair base can base on average 2 planes per base that do 2 or 3 rotations a day. Each airport maybe has demand for a new route. But becasue the planes at Bosnians bases are at full rotation capacity, there is need for a new plane. But both W6 and Raynair are not gonna deliver a new plane for 1 rotation a day. So they wait for news routes for demand. They probably can't find these routes. And so new possible routes with enough demand keep unreserved.
That why you need 1 or 2 bases. You have less people to share a larger serve area which leads to more demand. For airlines as W6 and Raynair it's easier to create new routes and deliver new planes.
Now Bosnia goes back to year 2000 where it was a vassel market for JU,OU,OS,LH,SR and TK. I hope Bosnia will restore this problem. I must say the geography of the country it not in it's favor and it also doesn't help that it is quite close to the gastarbeiter markets. Especially Germany and Austria.
There are two planes and one plane on certain days that operate two rotations from Skopje, because of a W rotation. The plane departs in the afternoon to Bkogna, and from there to Iasi and back, then back to Skp. So, all planes are used all the time, ever since, eith exception in 2021 and 2022 when there were still restrictions. On Mondays and Fridays, one plane even makes four rotations out of Skopje. Also, in 2019 wizz had 5 A320s at skp and 32 routes, while in Tuzla they had 2 and lets say 18 routes, plus lets say 10 routes of Ryanair feom Banja Luka that is around 25 to 30, so they did not have more planes at bih or more routed like you say.
DeleteBut they had also planes in SJJ
DeleteWizz didn't fly from NUE to BNX. How could that be compared with TZL.
DeleteThere are four airports in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Deleteand building two more . lol
DeleteWizz and FR are not fighting aginst each other at BNX anymore and both airlines are geting rid of their bad performing routs. As simple as that
ReplyDeleteThey have never faught at BNX, because they have both flown different routes.
Deletelaunching routes so that the other competiror wont be able to do the same is also fighting each other
DeleteBNX you need TK.
ReplyDelete+1
DeleteThe good thing is that Banja Luka doesn't rely on a single airline, like in Tuzla.
ReplyDeletehowever you try to spin around .... its always becomes a satira
DeleteI'm not spinning anything around. Just stating facts.
Deleteah the facts guy
DeleteWell that escalated quickly 😐😯
ReplyDeleteHope all routes will be resorted. At least it's some consolation that Charleroi will return.
ReplyDeletemeans the 3BAM Wunderwaffe tax is totally irrelevant
ReplyDeleteThere is a difference when 3 routes are discontinued, one of which is just suspended for the winter and when you close your entire base.
DeleteWell in Tuzla's case all airlines left it when they started imposing this tax. Ryanair and Wizz Air.
Deletedoubt it that was the real reason
DeleteSo what is the reason?
Deletelow performing routes?
DeleteThe delays really have somthing to do with this. Even yesterday, a few days ago or maybe everyday buy idk cuz i am not chechking it all the time, planes from other bases come to Tuzla to operate some flights. Plus the fog during the winter. I know they managed to operate with it for all these years but now they have other markets they need to focus about. Look at the Italian market today, it is not the same as it was in 2019. If the base in Tuzla was so strong, they wouldn't decide to close it. But i think that there is something else happening between both FR and W6 and the government.
Deleteyou are following too much politics ....
Deleteboth airlines expanded at the same time opening all possible routes which didnt prove to be as successful as they thought... they dont attack each other anymore ... filtering out everything that is mediocre
I don't see the reason for hard feelings and comments. Ryanair discontinued 2 routes because during winter there is no big passenger interest.
Deleteits called consolidation
ReplyDeleteRyan-end
ReplyDeleteLCCs leaving BiH en mass.
ReplyDeleteOuch!
ReplyDeleteFirst Wizz closes Sarajevo base, Ryanair ends all Tuzla flights, Wizz Air closes Tuzla base, now Wizz and Ryanair suspend some Banja Luka flights, other LCCs not interested in market at all....
ReplyDeleteTurkish would be a game changer in BL. I am still wondering why isnt JU caring about BL, is it possible they cant fill one ATR daily from BL?
ReplyDeleteBecause it is a low yielding route. That's why they don't care about it and don't want to waste resources on it.
DeleteThat’s exactly my question.
DeleteTimings are bad, but every time I flew with them they’ve been full.
Imagine if they actually had daily flights, so people don’t have to bus themselves to ZAG or BEG…
They even flew few times with A320 because of overbooking
Turkish? you will fly east 2 hours to transfer for a west flights . now that will make sense
DeleteBNX to BEG of course yield is low because of only 2 flights per week. What do you expect? JU should fly at least 3 times a week double daily
Deleteso low yield depends on the frequency? ok we learned something new
DeleteJU Where are you
ReplyDeleteNow can FR introduce Zagreb to Nuremberg and Berlin !!
ReplyDeleteHahaha how yea no
DeleteAnyhow, higher chances for FR to do that, then OU. They will keep on with Minken and Vrankvurt
DeleteThey are all moving to TIA.
ReplyDeletelol sure. they started Lanzarote from NUE and stopped BNX
Deletebtw this consolidation ...
DeleteFrom Berlin, Charloi and Berlin during winter they need planes to Canary Islands
DeleteAnd Nürnberg
DeleteBH needs an airline but not owned by the state, just privately. Nobody can tell that there is no potential.
ReplyDeleteMaybe JU can think about lounching routes from INI via BNX?
ReplyDeleteSaka cast = JU has as many rights to fly from BNX to EU as Jordan aviation
Deletesvaka*
DeleteINI via BNX to EU would be an option
Deleteyeh just like Jordan Aviation muhaha
Delete