Turkish carrier AtlasGlobal will continue to expand into former Yugoslavia this summer with the introduction of flights between Istanbul Ataturk Airport and Sarajevo. Speaking at a media event in Belgrade yesterday, the airline's regional Country Manager, Ender Karaca, said, "We plan to expand in the Balkans. Next we will introduce flights to Belgrade and Sarajevo. The Balkans is a great place for doing business". The airline previously announced it would launch daily flights from Istanbul to the Serbian capital on March 15, which are to be codeshared by Air Serbia. Ticket sales for AtlasGlobal's new Sarajevo service are expected to commence in the coming days. The two cities in the former Yugoslavia will become part of the seventeen new destinations the carrier intends to launch this year. Others in the region include Tirana and Bucharest.
AtlasGlobal will have strong competition on its Sarajevo service. The carrier will face off directly against Turkish Airlines, which will maintain eighteen weekly flights between the two cities this summer season. AtlasGlobal will become the first company other than Turkish to operate the route since 2014. Furthermore, low cost Pegasus Airlines will run nine weekly flights from Istanbul's Sabiha Gokcen Airport to Sarajevo. Previously known as Atlasjet, AtlasGlobal is a full fare carrier operating a fleet of 23 Airbus A319, A320 and A321 aircraft in a two-class configuration. It maintains operations throughout Turkey, northern Cyprus, the Middle East, Europe and Asia and sets itself apart from the competition by offering a generous baggage allowance policy of forty kilograms of checked-in luggage in business and thirty in economy on its international flights, which is above the industry average.
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| AtlasGlobal business class cabin |
Sarajevo Airport has previously said it anticipates seeing a "turning point" in its operations this year with plans to handle one million passengers. Besides AtlasGlobal, Wizz Air has announced the launch of two weekly flights from Budapest starting this April, while TUIFly Belgium will introduce seasonal services from Charleroi to the Bosnian capital. Furthermore, Swiss International Air Lines and Air Arabia will resume summer flights from Zurich and Sharjah respectively. Qatar Airways is expected to commence services from Doha, which were initially scheduled to launch in 2016. In a statement to EX-YU Aviation News, the airline said it is committed to honouring its plans of introducing four weekly flights to the Bosnian capital this year, but it is yet to schedule a launch date due to a delay in the arrival of new aircraft.
Comments
Tickets booked one week before flight for 24 + 13 = 37 EUR. Considering the price, I expected the half empty aircraft. On the contrary, flight BTS-INI (17.2.) estimation LF 95+%, on the way back INI-BTS (20.2.) estimation at least 85%. Really great for February.
Lot of Slovakians on board and also people speaking English. I didn't have an impression that majority of people are gastarbajters from Vienna. Myself, I was going to Nis from Czechia.
Mind you, they are also adding A330s to their fleet to serve some of their new Russian destinations.
Remember how a few years ago they operated charter flights from IST to BEG? That's how they filled all those A321s.
They always did well in Belgrade. When they used to run charters from the Turkish coast to Belgrade they used to send their B752s.
They are something like a Turkish version of TUI.
I guess they are turning into Jat slowly but surely. They have also decimated their scheduled flights in favor of the charter ones.
Belgrade was an extremely successful destination for them. Now they are committing to the market.
Their business model was much different from JU's. Unfortunately Air Serbia didn't stand a chance in Istanbul.
There was a plan to re-open NIC for scheduled traffic but the approach would have to take place over the northern parts of the island so they gave up on the idea.
In the early 1970s a JAT B727 crashed on approach to NIC.
Also, I highly doubt Croatia will ever be as popular as Greece for Serbs.
JU had zero agreements with Turkish tour operators. The demand for Belgrade city break is HUGE in Turkey - but most of the people buy packages from tour operators rather than arranging individual trips. This is where Atlas was always doing great while JU was shrinking its office in Istanbul and eventually closed it down for good.
EU military jets use either Larnaca or the British military airport in Akrotiri right next to Limassol.
As for Ercan, several airlines sell direct flights to Europe but the plane has to first land at a Turkish airport.
As far as the cities goes, well... they are quite dirty, unsafe and you really need to be careful where you eat. The best solution is to go south and then to spend a few days in the north.
Best wishes to Atlas on SJJ, BEG and future Ex-YU routes.
Btw, is there any reason why they have so many stewards on certain lines? Regulations or...? Why having 5 stewards if they need just 2 minutes to pull the carriages through the aircraft with meals and drinks because nobody is buying anything.
- Their network out of Istanbul perfectly complements the one of Air Serbia and covers a black-hole from BEG which are places like Erbil, Suleymaniyah, Baghdad, Mineralnye Vodi, Erevan etc.
- They're antagonistic to TK which more than them flies "to every village in Ukraine"
- They've got the best service among Turkish carriers, they're somewhat of a Turkish QR
- Behind them is a huge tour operator similar to what Putnik was in Yugoslavia
- Their expansion and overall network is done very intelligently, further proven by this last wave of expansion (Belgrade, Bucharest, Tirana, Sarajevo...)
Now sorry to break your childish party but this was really worthy of 3 years old.
Nevertheless, countries who benefited most from the Russian tourists last year, could be slightly disappointed (Greek islands for example).
JU's capacity switch from scheduled flights to charters might be related to that fact.
You seem to forget that FAs are there primarily for safety, and not just to move the carts around :)