Norwegian's Swedish unit to wet lease an A320

Malta’s Valletta Airlines eyes 2023 launch for ACMI ops

Norwegian to launch Riga base, adds more B737 MAX 8s

Norwegian Group has announced it will open a base at Riga airport ahead of the Summer 2023 season as a "kind of a test" to trial growth outside its core markets in the Nordic countries and Spain.

"We see Riga as an opportunity to do steps outside of the Nordics, but at the same time, we see that Riga and the countries around are actually just an extended part of the Nordics... We have quite a huge office in Riga today as well. So, we see this actually as kind of an extension of the Nordics where we can also use the base in Riga to fly into the Nordics," Chief Executive Geir Karlsen said during the carrier's quarterly earnings call.

Karlsen said the base would initially comprise two aircraft but did not reveal any planned network.

The ch-aviation capacities module shows the Latvian capital is currently dominated by local carrier airBaltic (BT, Riga), which has a 58.7% market share by scheduled weekly capacity. While Norwegian is the third-largest carrier at the...

Norwegian details future fleet plans, contemplates MAX 10s

Norwegian (DY, Oslo Gardermoen) has posted a NOK1.25 billion krone (USD129.5 million) profit for 2Q 2022 largely on the back of reversing pre-delivery payments to Boeing (BOE, Washington National) for MAX jets. Approximately NOK2.1 billion (USD217.1 million) was reversed in the quarter after settling a long-running dispute with Boeing, pushing the airline into the black for the period.

"(We're) very happy that we have now finally had an agreement with Boeing in place," Norwegian Chief Executive Officer Geir Karlsen said in an earnings call this week. "I think we can say that we feel that we have done a really good agreement with Boeing."

In June 2020, Norwegian cancelled orders for ninety-two B737-8 MAX and five B787-9s, at the same time accusing Boeing of “gross negligence and shoddy production.” Boeing fought the lawsuit, but in June 2022, both parties agreed to settle. A compensation settlement with Boeing allowed Norwegian to reverse those pre-delivery payments this quarter. As part of the settlement, Norwegian is using those funds to re-order fifty...

TUI fly (Netherlands) wet-leases an A320

TUI fly (Netherlands) (OR, Amsterdam Schiphol) has wet-leased an A320-200 from Bulgaria's Fly2Sky (F6, Sofia) to support its operations in August 2022.

LZ-MDO (msn 879) was ferried from Oslo Gardermoen to Amsterdam Schiphol on August 1, 2022, and began operating for the Dutch TUI Group unit on the same day. It remains based out of the Dutch gateway and is deployed on a variety of routes to Greece, Spain, and Turkey. The ACMI contract covers the entire month of August.

Fly2Sky operates three A320-200s, the ch-aviation fleets advanced module shows. The remaining two aircraft are wet-leased to Norwegian Air Sweden AOC and Aegean Airlines. The Bulgarian ACMI/charter specialist also operates two A321-200s which are currently wet-leased to Transavia France and Aegean Airlines.

In turn, TUI fly (Netherlands) operates an in-house fleet of six B737-8s, one B767-300(ER), and three B787-8s. The airline supplements its fleet with a wide portfolio of wet-leased aircraft, currently comprising a B757-200 operated by Icelandair,...