Croatia Airlines limits international network to fifteen in October


Croatia Airlines will maintain flights to fifteen international destinations during the month of October, twelve of which will run from Zagreb, ten from Split, two from Dubrovnik and one from Rijeka. Domestic flights will operate from the Croatian capital to five destinations, two from Osijek, and one each from Split and Dubrovnik. “The national carrier has proven itself to be an important factor in the country’s transport infrastructure during these extraordinary circumstances, given that it never stopped flying and was the only airline to have continuously enabled Croatia’s connectivity to the world during this epidemiological crisis. During the peak summer season, the company’s aircraft linked Zagreb directly with fourteen destinations, Split with eleven and Dubrovnik with seven international destinations”, Croatia Airlines said in a statement.

Unlike in September, the carrier will no longer maintain operations from Zagreb to Athens and Dublin and will run fewer frequencies on a number of routes. Last year, the airline maintained 24 international destinations from the Croatian capital. As part of its international network, during October the carrier will fly to Amsterdam, Brussels, Copenhagen, Frankfurt, London Heathrow, Munich, Paris, Rome, Sarajevo, Skopje, Vienna and Zurich from Zagreb, to Berlin, Dusseldorf, Frankfurt, London Heathrow, Lyon, Munich, Paris, Rome, Vienna and Zurich from Split, to Frankfurt and Rome from Dubrovnik, as well as to Munich from Rijeka. Due to a number of travel restrictions and declining demand, Croatia Airlines cancelled 80% of its planned flights during September.

The Croatian government will unveil plans to financially assist its national carrier in the coming weeks. On Thursday, it approved a deadline extension for the repayment of an 8.5 million euro loan the company took from one state-owned and one private bank in 2018 in order to finance the overhaul of its engines. Initially, the loan was to be repaid by December 31, 2022, but an extension has been granted until June 30, 2023. The Croatian Ministry for Sea, Transport and Infrastructure noted the carrier had requested for the deferral in payments of certain obligations due to difficulties arising from the Covid-19 pandemic. The changes primarily relate to the maturity and repayment of the loan, the repayment method, calculation of interest and the interest period.

Comments

  1. Anonymous09:03

    This is quite low number of routes but good to see no major route cancellations compared to Sept.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Anonymous09:04

    Poor Mostar, it really won't have any flights this year. I was expecting OU would resume it.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Anonymous10:19

      Me too :(

      Delete
    2. Anonymous10:51

      The route was mostly empty before corona. Imagine now.

      Delete
    3. Anonymous17:08

      If it were better timed it could have had more transfers.

      Delete
    4. Anonymous17:53

      True. Those flights are catastrophically timed!

      Delete
  3. Anonymous09:10

    What about frequencies on these routes?

    Also I find it kind of wrong that the government pressured a private bank to provide OU with an extension.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Anonymous13:10

      I have a feeling Kresimir Kucko will come back to save the day.

      Delete
    2. Anonymous17:09

      Bite your tounge

      Delete
    3. Anonymous17:12

      Why? At least OU was profitable while he was in charge and they launched many new routes.

      Delete
  4. Anonymous09:13

    I find it odd that OU suspended SPU-BEG especially with so many Serbs going to Croatia this summer. JU is even now running flights with A319!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Anonymous09:24

      Well demand was not so large this summer. Even JU reduced flights from 6 weakly, to 4 weakly, then to 2 weakly and again to 4 weakly.

      Delete
    2. Anonymous09:46

      There is huge difference between flying 4 pw and not flying at all.

      Delete
    3. Anonymous09:49

      And it is 4 pw with A319, not with ATR72

      Delete
    4. Anonymous13:00

      Anon 9:46
      ??

      Delete
    5. Anonymous17:51

      anon 13:00
      ???

      Delete
  5. Anonymous09:13

    Is it me or is DUB a very difficult market for OU?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Anonymous09:26

      Usually is not but for this winter they will resume flights only to the most important markets.

      Delete
    2. Anonymous10:14

      I believe DUB was a seasonal route anyway no?

      Delete
    3. Anonymous10:15

      No, it became year round last year
      https://www.exyuaviation.com/2018/12/croatia-airlines-upgrades-dublin-service.html

      Delete
    4. Anonymous10:19

      Oh ok, missed that

      Delete
    5. Anonymous11:04

      they have a harsh 14 day q. even ryanair is thinking to close Cork&Shannon for the winter

      Delete
    6. Anonymous11:32

      Yes, I think Ireland only has 5 countries on its green list. FR has launched a campaign against the government but they are not changing their decision.

      Delete
  6. Anonymous09:47

    80% of planned flights cancelled in September!
    That's huge.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Anonymous14:02

      When tourism goes down to near winter levels in September that is the reality.

      Delete
  7. Anonymous09:53

    This shows how important domestic travel is in Croatia and important for OU. Today for instance, you have flights to DBV, SPU, BUT and ZAD. Yesterday 2 daily OSI flights with Trade Air.
    Last night OU 320 deployed to DBV!
    AF also sending 320 and VY still operating from BCN.
    Overall, picture is pretty decent.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Anonymous10:00

      VY flights end next week.

      Delete
  8. Anonymous10:09

    Considering I read that Alitalia will have just 15 international routes, we can conclude that OU is operating at the same level :D

    ReplyDelete
  9. Anonymous10:10

    Will OU keep the extra flights to Frankfurt as replacement for Lufthansa?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Anonymous10:10

      From Zagreb I mean

      Delete
    2. Anonymous10:50

      I don't think the winter season timetable is still finalized.

      Delete
    3. Anonymous13:13

      LH won't be flying ZAG-FRA that is for sure.

      According to Purger OU pushed them away from ZAG :-)

      Delete
    4. Anonymous14:02

      Actually on some way they did. OU has soo good realtions with LH so they liierally gave them all the market because of great relations.

      Delete
    5. Anonymous14:05

      Must be a big profit maker for LH to have handed it over so generously because of "great relations".

      Delete
    6. Anonymous14:58

      Really makes you think how profitable markets such as ZAG or LJU are for LH when they are not really fighting to have them for themselves. If they were making money on FRA-ZAG they would have stayed, they struggled even before corona. They downgraded it to Embraer.

      Delete
    7. Anonymous17:10

      Remember tgat LH happily left Adria to fly all German routes until they went bust.

      Delete
    8. Nemjee20:29

      Actually, I wouldn't be surprised if LH ignores our region for a while longer. In the aftermath of the World Economic Crisis, German economy was boosted by trade with China. German companies earned billions from exporting machinery to China which they then used to manufacture their goods for export. This time around, many Chinese companies have developed their own technologies which they used to buy from Germany. For example, the expansion of the Stockholm metro was awarded to a Chinese company while Porto selected Chinese made trains for their metro (a first in Europe). The Stockholm metro is extremely interesting because the technology they have now used to be imported from Germany up until the crisis.

      All this means that it will take much longer for the German economy to recover this time around. This will no doubt impact Lufthansa's recovery which also includes our region. For Air Serbia this could be good news as they are not linked to LH Group but for OU it could mean that more 'responsibility' will be shifted to them ... at least in ZAG.

      This could be a perfect opportunity for AF-KL in our region. We saw how aggressive they were in LJU, ZAG and BEG before the crisis.

      https://www.globalconstructionreview.com/news/stockholm-criticised-awarding-impossible-metro-con/

      Delete
    9. Anonymous22:20

      I hope Hrvatska never allows any Chinese on its soil for business. They can visit and such but not more than this.
      Luckily, the metros in Bucuresti and Sofia are and were not touched by them Chinese personnas.
      Let's all learn from Slovenia and it's bitter Chinese experience with Maribor. Thanks, but no thanks!

      Delete
    10. Anonymous22:47

      Well, Croatia chose the Chinese for Pelješac bridge.

      Delete
    11. Anonymous08:01

      Interesting Nemjee, I didn't know about those things.

      Delete
  10. Anonymous10:28

    I hope it stays at this number during the winter season.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Anonymous10:38

      It won't because in winter OU only flies to Rome, Frankfurt, Munich and Zagreb from Split.

      Delete
    2. Anonymous13:04

      That is probably most usefull part of having OU. International winter flights from the coast.

      Delete
    3. Anonymous17:11

      ^ they should do more with the coast. Both summer and winter.

      Delete
  11. Anonymous10:36

    Glad to see LHR connected to more than 1 Croatian city.
    It seems that BRU also is a very important destination because of EU.
    The surprise is having winter flights LYS-SPU. Traditionally, it's Germany.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Anonymous10:37

      It's not a winter flight. This is until start of winter season. Then almost all routes end from SPU.

      Delete
  12. Anonymous10:49

    One thing I got to give to OU is that they kept flying through the lockdowns. That's commendable.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Anonymous17:54

      Croatians did not have EU ban.

      Delete
  13. Anonymous10:49

    I'm wondering, if anyone knows, do a lot of Slovenians still fly with OU from Zagreb? Or is that complicated now with the quarantine procedures?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Anonymous17:55

      There were never "a lot" of Slovenians in ZAG.

      You saw in ZAG those who had no other choice but to fly from there. Much more Slovenians used the possibilities flying on connecting flights from LJU.

      Delete
    2. Anonymous19:36

      @anon 17:55

      that's not true at all. Majority of public tenders had priority to use direct flights which is only possible from ZAG. In addition, with only one flight to major hub (FRA), Slovenians are very limited to get any decent connections. So there are a LOT of pax going from ZAG. They even put a exception in decree that quarantine does not apply for Slovenians flying from/to Croatia airports. They would not put that in decree if there wasn't huge amount of people travelling from there.


      Delete
    3. Anonymous20:08

      Speaking of Slovenia, there are two charters to Paris from LJU tomorrow because of Tour de France. One is being operated by Trade Air (with their 'new' plane) and the other by Croatia Airlines.

      Delete
    4. Anonymous20:28

      Yes, it is. Slovenians are very practical people. As I said they fly through ZAG only if they have to.

      Direct flights do have advantages but these flights do not depart from their country but from the airport that is almost 2 hours drive from LJU (one way!), where they have to possibly wait on the border, to have the risk of getting late to the airport due to possible road blocks, to pay for fuel for 4 hours drive, to pay toll, to pay for parking on Zagreb airport and many more...
      Much easier is to take the flights from their airport to FRA (2 flights daily by LH and not only one!), to IST, to BEG or to CDG (10 weekly) and fly to their final destinations without any worry if anything is going to interrupt their journey. Not to mention that ZAG does not offer any connections to Eastern Europe.
      Of course that quarantine does not apply for SLO citizens from ZAG as neither Croatia is on red EU list nor Slovenia.

      Delete
    5. Anonymous22:34

      There was a recent Eurostat survey which showed that Lithuania, Portugal and Slovenia are the nations with the highest percentage of road or car transport in Europe. All this confirms the theory that, similar to Swedes, Slovenia are ditching planes and taking other means of transportation.

      https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/en/web/products-eurostat-news/-/EDN-20200916-1?inheritRedirect=true&redirect=/eurostat/en/news/whats-new

      Slovenia just hates planes :D

      Delete
    6. Anonymous07:31

      Wrong again.

      Here provided information are for INLAND transport. As there are no domestic air routes in Slovenia and the farthest point is only 2,5 hours drive it would be surprise final results to be anyhow different.

      Delete
  14. Anonymous11:04

    whats their freq to SKP & SJJ nowadays?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Anonymous11:18

      SKP is just 2 per week.

      Delete
    2. Anonymous11:24

      Sarajevo is also just 2 per week but all flights are cancelled until the 25th of September.

      Delete
    3. Anonymous13:00

      :(

      Delete
    4. Anonymous14:00

      I don't see that being convenient for transfers.

      Delete
  15. Anonymous13:00

    Winter is going to be tough

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Anonymous15:36

      Maybe cold and snowy too! )))

      Delete
  16. Anonymous19:34

    Three years from now LCCs will have aircraft based at ZAG, LH will fly from ZAG to hubs and OU will have the same fate as Adria. Tradeair will get bigger and will serve more domestic lines with PSO.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Anonymous23:31

      you wish...but ain’t gonna happen. ;-)

      Delete
    2. Anonymous23:38

      A 4 million country having 2 major carriers, developed domestic network, 9 operational international airports, prestigious coastline is a milestone. Not to mention that DBV is the jewel of the Balkans.

      Delete
    3. Anonymous00:31

      Some said Adria would never go bankrupt.

      Delete
    4. Anonymous00:53

      It would be nice to see more co-operation on routes between Croatia Airlines and Trade Air.I have seen the code-share on the flights from Osijek to the domestic airports.

      Delete
  17. Anonymous09:24

    Flights are operated half empty and the company still did not consolidate its international routes at a single airport to maximize the efficiency. What a waste of money and resources.

    ReplyDelete
  18. Anonymous10:00

    People here just don't seem to get how bad the situation is in the aviation industry.

    ReplyDelete
  19. Anonymous10:01

    Disaster

    ReplyDelete

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