Qatar Airways has shelved plans to resume operations from Doha to both Sarajevo and Skopje during the summer of 2021. Services to both cities were suspended in March of last year and were initially to be restored on October 25, 2020 before being delayed until late March of this year. However, all ticket sales have now been halted until the start of the 2021/2022 winter season from October 30. Changes remain possible. The Qatari carrier is instead offering one-stop connections to the capitals of Bosnia and Herzegovina and Macedonia via Zagreb, Belgrade, Vienna and Istanbul in cooperation with Croatia Airlines, Air Serbia, Austrian Airlines and Pegasus Airlines throughout the summer.
The carrier first introduced services to both Sarajevo and Skopje back in 2017 and has maintained them continuously with its Airbus A320 fleet until the start of the coronavirus pandemic. Flydubai will continue to link Bosnia and Herzegovina and Macedonia with the Gulf this coming summer. The hybrid carrier, which has already resumed flights to Sarajevo, will serve the city four times per week during the coming summer while services to Skopje resume on March 29 and will run twice per week. Sarajevo will also see the return of Air Arabia from Sharjah during the peak summer months.
Services to the Qatari airline’s two other remaining destinations in the former Yugoslavia - Belgrade and Zagreb - will continue to operate into the summer as well, following their resumption in July of last year. Flights to Belgrade will run four times per week with the A320 jet until June, after which they will increase to ten weekly. On the other hand, flights to Zagreb will run three times per week until June, after which it will increase to double daily. Operations to both cities will run with the A320 aircraft. At this point, schedules past June will likely be revised.
Wasn't Zagreb reduced to one weekly until summer?
ReplyDeleteNo. It was only for one month.
DeleteWhich month?
Deletehttps://www.exyuaviation.com/2021/01/qatar-airways-reduces-zagreb-service.html
DeleteLooking at their website seems like one weekly flight to ZAG was extended to the end of March. Flights operate on Friday. Not good.
DeleteOne weekly?
DeleteIt is nothing.
Yes, it was extended from 17.02 all the way to 29.03. I imagine advance bookings were extremely bad and they don't think anything will change until summer.
DeleteThey won't come back probably.
ReplyDeleteWow that is unfortunate
ReplyDeleteWas SKP 4 p/w year round?
ReplyDeleteA good indication of which routes perform well for them in the region.
ReplyDeleteOh wow, canceling the whole summer season, even Sarajevo ... that is a big blow.
ReplyDeleteSarajevo I can't even see tickets for next winter. Skopje is there.
DeleteI just noticed, no tickets on sale :(
ReplyDeleteReally bad week for SKP.
ReplyDeleteMaybe the government can give subsidies to Wizz to launch SKP-DOH?
ReplyDeleteWho will fly on this route? Does wizz offer some connections via DOH? That would be only for P2P passengers. Qatar that has option for connections wasnt doing great even before corona
DeleteMore and more people self-connect. This could be a brilliant opportunity for Wizz and they could use the subsidies to move some people from DXB and IST to DOH. Also many Qatari tourists can come to MKD.
DeleteThey can't fly from SKP to DOH....
DeleteOuch.
ReplyDeleteShame that OU is cutting SJJ, they could get a lot of feed.
ReplyDeleteIf they could get a lot of feed, they wouldn't cut it...
DeleteCurrently everyone are cutting, but for summer season i think they will have same frequency towards SJJ.
DeleteI think that JU did not cut SJJ
DeleteWe are talking about OU. Everyone are cutting
DeleteOS also didn't cut SJJ!
DeleteFZ & TK did not cut SJJ
DeleteThey did.
DeleteWho currently flies into SJJ and SKP? Which airlines?
ReplyDeleteSKP: Air Serbia, Austrian, Chair, Croatia, Pegasus, Turkish, Windrose, Wizz
DeleteSJJ: Air Serbia, Austrian, flydubai, Turkish
So basically SJJ is on par with LJU now in terms of airlines that fly there? Only goes to show how incompetent airport management is.
DeleteNot really because SJJ has much more flights than LJU.
DeleteThings will get much better when airline opens base there.
DeleteThis is sad news because QR at the moment has one of the biggest networks.
ReplyDelete+1
DeleteUnlike other Gulf carriers QR wasn't performing that well in SJJ which was shown in their lack of frequencies.
ReplyDeleteBecause of the bloclade they could not get connecting traffic from GCC which is the main reason other Gulf carriers perform well.
DeleteSo, how many airlines has SKP lost so far during this year?
ReplyDelete- Wizzair SZG
- Windrose KBP
- Qatar Airways - DOH
Are Sunexpress returning from ADB?
Is Aegean coming back?
DeleteThe advanced bookings must have been poor.
ReplyDeleteProbably. QR does not make these decisions lightly.
DeleteNot surprised at all. These two routes are one of the few they launched with low frequencies and never increased them.
ReplyDeleteThis is an opportunity for Flydubai to better position itself in SKP and SJJ.
ReplyDeleteDon't think so. Even before QR, FZ struggled in SKP. Their loads were around 70%. On such a long flight that's not great. TK is king in SKP.
DeleteHow if the market is just not there? Look at their planned frequnecies. They have actually decreased Sarajevo this month while SKP will be just 2 per week.
DeleteAlso the fact that they didn't bring in these two routes earlier as a result of QR absence speaks volumes.
DeleteLet's wait and see if FZ cull their network too. Very possible they won't resume SKP either.
DeleteI'm surprised. Was expecting Qatar to be among the first back.
ReplyDeleteYou know things are seriously bad when QR abandons markets.
DeleteUnfortunately this will be the post Covid world and this is probably light compared to what other airlines will do.
ReplyDeleteLike the title of an article in the Economist reads - "The new nearly normal will be a long way from status quo".
DeleteDespite this, kudos to QR for flying to so many cities.
ReplyDeleteI hope they return next winter.
ReplyDeleteIt's really unfortunate because this is the only oneworld airline operating to Sarajevo and Skopje. Hope we see them back.
ReplyDeleteSarajevo looks to be cut entirely.
ReplyDeleteSeems so :(
DeleteSJJ - Doha was very important for Bosnia, since Doha is a major hub for entire Asia.
ReplyDeleteThere are still connections via Dubai
DeleteIt can be important on paper but if demand is just not there then there isn't much that can be done at this point in space and time.
Deletechance for Wizz Air Abu Dhabi :D
ReplyDeletei doubt they will fly double daily to ZAG and 10 weekly to BEG in the summer.
ReplyDeleteFor ZAG I bellieve you...
DeleteOf course they won't. The article says these just haven't been revised yet. They originally had these schedules from late March (10 weekly BEG and double daily ZAG) but they have already moved it to June.
DeleteI think this is expected, just flew with Qatar from BEG and there were only 38 persons onboard. If BEG can't fill in a plane, there is no way SKP or SJJ will, and will take a loooong time for the market to recover. On a side note, out of these 38 persons, there were 8 people from Macedonia flying to Zanzibar with QR through tour agency...
ReplyDelete