Czech Airlines to launch up to 19 new Destinations in Summer 2015

CSA Czech Airlines ATR72 (© O. Pritzkow)
CSA Czech Airlines ATR72 (© O. Pritzkow)

Up to 19 new destinations and 25 regular scheduled connections are planned by Czech Airlines for the upcoming summer season. Alongside flights from Prague to Billund, Bilbao, Bologna, Cork and Oslo, which the carrier announced last autumn, Czech Airlines is also planning to operate flights to Athens, Bordeaux, Liverpool, Porto and Stavanger, and to launch regular connections to Venice, Kristiansand, Växjö, Linköping, Poznan, Gdansk, Stuttgart and several additional routes from Stuttgart to the south-west of Europe.

Czech Airlines will operate 48 destinations in 24 countries throughout the 2015 summer season; together with its partners, the carrier will service more than 120 destinations in 50 countries.

“Expanding our transport network will allow us to use the fleet more efficiently, primarily our ATR aircraft which will be used to service more than half of the new routes,” explained Jozef Sinčák, Chairman of the Czech Airlines Board of Directors, adding: “Concurrently, we have been relocating the capacity freed in the Russian market which has been experiencing a significant drop in demand for travel to the Czech Republic and Europe.” For this reason, the carrier has also reconsidered its planned launch of operations on two new routes to Russia, to Kazan and Kaliningrad, originally planned for this summer season. The launch, together with renewal of the seasonal flights to Perm and Ufa, was postponed by Czech Airlines until the 2016 summer season.

New Connections Operated Year-Round

Czech Airlines ATR72 (© O. Pritzkow)
Czech Airlines ATR72 (© O. Pritzkow)

Czech Airlines plans to use Airbus A319 aircraft to service the following, year-round-operated routes: Liverpool (twice weekly from 18 May) and Oslo (up to four times a week from 30 March), while Billund (four times a week from 30 March), Bologna (four times a week from 29 March), Poznan, Gdansk (both four times a week from 25 May) and Stuttgart (three times a week from
26 May) will be serviced by ATR aircraft. The Poznan and Gdansk flights will be operated similarly to the Prague–Bratislava–Košice and Prague–Hamburg–Gothenburg models, i.e. as the Prague–Poznan–Gdansk route (also in reverse order).

Czech Airlines plans to launch up from Stuttgart, the capital of the Baden-Württemberg region, new regular connections to Prague (three times a week), Bologna (three times a week), Geneva (five times a week) and Marseille (four times a week), designed for both corporate and leisure clientele. The Poznan and Gdansk flights will be operated similarly to the Prague–Hamburg–Gothenburg model, i.e. as the Stuttgart–Geneva–Marseille route (also in reverse order)

New Seasonal Connections

Flights to Bilbao (twice weekly from 1 June), Bordeaux (twice weekly from 4 June), Cork (twice weekly from 14 May) and Porto (twice weekly from 18 May) will only be offered in the summer season and operated by A319 aircraft, as are flights to Athens (up to four times a week from 3 May) and Stavanger (twice weekly from 21 May). Based on the demand experienced, Czech Airlines will consider launching year-round operations on the last two routes.

The planned connections to Venice (three times a week from 1 July) and Kristiansand in Norway (twice weekly from 2 July), Växjö and Linköping in Sweden (twice weekly as one route: Prague-Växjö-Linköping and back from 29 June) as well as the new direct flights to Gothenburg (twice weekly from 29 June) without a stop-over in Hamburg will be operated by ATR aircraft during the summer break months, i.e. in July and August. The Venice connection has been primarily designed for Czech tourists heading to the most visited Italian city, while the flights from Norway and Sweden are designed for incoming tourism, bringing clients to Prague and the Czech Republic.

Ten New Code-Shared Destinations with Travel Service

Travel Service Boeing 737-800 (© O. Pritzkow)
Travel Service Boeing 737-800 (© O. Pritzkow)

The mutually beneficial co-operation with Travel Service on a code-share basis will also continue during the upcoming 2015 summer season. Thanks to this co-operation, Czech Airlines can offer its customers additional ten new services, such as flights to the following holiday destinations: Faro in Portugal, Funchal in Madeira, Fuerteventura and Lanzarote in the Canary Islands, Podgorica in Monte Negro, Preveza and Samos island in Greece, Tirana in Albania, Varna on the Bulgarian Black Sea coast and London-Gatwick. The above-listed routes will be operated by Travel Service under its SmartWings brand and Czech Airlines will have its OK code for all flights. Both carriers have also planned to include the new SmartWings’ connection to Moscow in their code-share co-operation, while Travel Service will receive its code for some of the new Czech Airlines’ routes.

Czech Airlines