European carriers suspend ops amid increased border controls

Latvia’s airBaltic still eyeing A321neo(XLR)s

airBaltic (BT, Riga) chief executive Martin Gauss has reiterated that longer-range Airbus jets, specifically the A321-200NX(XLR), continue to be of interest to the airline at some point in the future as it considers more distant destinations rather than acquire widebody aircraft.

According to the ch-aviation fleets advanced module, airBaltic currently operates a single-type fleet of thirty-six A220-300s, with 14 more on order (and options for 30 more), and is wet-leasing in extra capacity - currently two A319-100s (from Carpatair and Hi Fly Malta) and a B737-400 (from Air Horizont) - to cope with resurgent summer demand while it wet-leases out some of its A220s during the summer 2022 season.

Telling Airways Magazine in an interview that the A220 has been “the right choice for airBaltic’s fleet renewal” because of its fuel efficiency and it being “an overall excellent flying experience” for customers, at the tail-end of the 2021-22 winter season it received its first A220-300 certified to operate up to 149 seats, as opposed to...

Germany's EW Discover to boost Finnair wet-lease

Romania's Dan Air secures ACMI placements for Summer 2022

Brussels approves €45mn recap’n of Latvia’s airBaltic

The European Commission has approved the second half of a EUR90 million euro (USD97 million) recapitalisation package to airBaltic (BT, Riga) under temporarily slackened European Union state aid rules to businesses hard hit by the Covid-19 pandemic, the commission said in a statement.

The EUR45 million (USD48.5 million) is half of the sum that the Latvian flag carrier said in December was “still subject to the approval of the European Commission” and was itself split into two measures: EUR11.6 million (USD11.5 million) to cover damage suffered between June 16, 2020, and June 14, 2021; and EUR33.4 million (USD36 million) for the period to the end of June 2022. The other EUR45 million was approved in December.

The funding will be injected in return for new state-held shares and tops up the government’s emergency investment of EUR250 million (USD292 million) in the company’s equity at the height of the crisis in 2020.

“Due to the coronavirus pandemic and the travel restrictions that Latvia and other countries had to impose to limit the spread of...