14.04.2021 - 07:03 UTC
SmartLynx Airlines (6Y, Riga) has announced it will enter the German and Swiss leisure markets in summer 2021, operating full charter flights to destinations in the Mediterranean on behalf of TUI Deutschland.
The carrier will fly on behalf of the TUI Group subsidiary from Basel/Mulhouse/Freiburg, CH and Saarbrücken.
Starting in October, the airline will also launch full charter flights out of Hamburg Helmut Schmidt, Hanover, and Munich to the Canary Islands (Las Palmas, Fuerteventura, and Tenerife Sur) on behalf of Involatus.
"The ongoing travel restrictions and the hesitant course of vaccinations show that the demand for air travel will probably concentrate on autumn. We see disproportionately high bookings, especially in October," Managing Director of Involatus Erkan Türkoral said in the travel agent's statement.
"With TUI Deutschland and Involatus, we have found two strong partners for the coming season who are able to make their flight programme a success even in difficult times," Chief Executive Žygimantas Surintas said.
The airline said that it...
21.10.2020 - 17:02 UTC
GLOBALX (Miami Int'l) has signed a letter of intent with lessor Vallair to lease ten A321-200(P2F)s converted freighters with deliveries scheduled between the third quarter of 2021 and the second quarter of 2023. The order includes five units previously announced under an LOI for conversion with Singapore Paya Lebar-based ST Engineering and five incremental.
"Over the next six months, we intend to secure aircraft contracts for both our current and future needs through to the end of 2022 and in agreeing this lease, Vallair has enabled us to achieve this - certainly from a freighter perspective. Our focus has always been on utilising the efficiencies of A320 family aircraft and these pioneering A321 conversions by Vallair have allowed us to extend this to our cargo capability," Chief Executive Ed Wegel said.
GLOBALX currently plans to launch in January 2021. It intends to operate both passenger and cargo services. According to the carrier's investor update from early October 2020, the first of ten initial A320-200s is due to deliver in November...
18.10.2020 - 21:55 UTC
SmartLynx Airlines Malta (LYX, Malta Int'l) has signed a lease contract with Vallair to add two newly converted A321-200(P2F) to its fleet of passenger aircraft, it revealed in a statement on October 15.
The subsidiary of leisure charter and ACMI specialist SmartLynx Airlines (6Y, Riga) said it would be the first operator to have A321-200Fs converted by both 321 Precision Conversions - a joint venture between Air Transport Services Group and Precision Aircraft Solutions - and Elbe Flugzeugwerke, an ST Engineering joint venture with Airbus.
“Despite minor differences in direct operational costs, the company decided to go with both STCs [supplemental type certificates] to be able to offer its customers flexibility to compare and choose according to their requirements,” the statement said.
One of the two aircraft is N322WS (msn 891), a 22.1-year-old aircraft formerly operated by Air Méditerranée (ML, Lourdes/Tarbes) and currently undergoing conversion at Orlando Sanford, according to the ch-aviation fleets advanced module.
The other is N417PB (msn 1017), a 21.5-year-old...
03.07.2020 - 21:28 UTC
SmartLynx Airlines (6Y, Riga) resumed leisure charters on July 1, operating its first summer charter of 2020 from Tallinn Lennart Meri to Heraklion with A320-200 YL-LCU (msn 1762).
The airline has yet to resume leisure charters from its home market, Latvia. Since the imposition of COVID-related lockdowns around Europe in mid-March 2020, SmartLynx Airlines has been using its fleet of six A320-200s and six A321-200s to operate ad-hoc charters, including repatriation flights in Europe and elsewhere.
While most of the airline's aircraft are either parked or used for ad-hoc operations, one of its A320-200s, YL-LCO (msn 1873), was ferried to St. Athan on July 2.
The fleets of the airline's subsidiaries SmartLynx Airlines Estonia (MYX, Tallinn Lennart Meri) and SmartLynx Airlines Malta (LYX, Malta Int'l) remain inactive. The former unit's five A320-200s and the latter's two units of the type are all currently parked.
Editorial Comment: The article has been updated to reflect that YL-LCO was not permanently retired. - 07.07.2020 - 09:00 UTC
