Despite ongoing concerns about its finances, Spanish budget carrier Volotea (V7, Barcelona El Prat) will open what it says will be its seventh base in Italy, at Florence Peretola, in 2023 as it raises capacity in the country next year beyond that of 2019.
It will allocate a single A319-100 to the Tuscan city and launch to nine destinations from there, to Bari, Bilbao, Cagliari, Catania, Palermo International, Toulouse Blagnac, and three more to be named in the coming weeks. First to open will be the unserved route linking Bilbao with Florence, 2x weekly, to start on April 8.
According to the ch-aviation capacities module, Volotea does not currently operate any flights to Florence. Just one airline has a crew base there, namely Vueling Airlines (VY, Barcelona El Prat), also a Spanish low-cost carrier. Volotea does, however, operate summer-season routes to nearby Pisa airport, from Olbia and Nantes.
Volotea currently operates a fleet of 41 aircraft in 2022, the ch-aviation fleets module shows, compared to 36 in summer 2019. These are twenty A319s and twenty-one A320-200s. Florence will be its 19th base in Europe overall.
