Batch of carriers eye Bulgarian budget air travel market
2008-10-30 09:00:00
Four no-frills carriers have notified the Sofia International Airport of their interest to offer regular flights to and from Bulgaria starting January 1, 2007 when the local aviation market opens to competition. Italian low-cost airline Myair will introduce on February 15, 2007 a new flight between Bologna, northern Italy, and Sofia, the company said in a statement quoted by news agency ANSA on Tuesday. The service will be available three times a week. Ireland's Ryanair, Britain's easyJet and Germany's Germanwings have also forwarded a flight schedule to the Sofia airport. Ryanair has proposed a service between Sofia and Frankfurt, Dnevnik learned from the Sofia airport. EasyJET wants to fly between Sofia and London. The company confirmed it was in talks with 50 airports, including Bulgaria. Several budget carriers are also seeking regulator slots from 2007 at the Burgas airport, on the Black Sea. Norwegian Air Shuttle, Britain's Thomsonfly, Germanwings and Ryanair are all interested in flying to Burgas, said Kalin Barzov, executive director of the airport. The Norwegian carrier has proposed flights to Poland, Norway and the rest of Scandinavia from March 2007. German Wings will fly from Burgas to Duesseldorf and Cologne. SkyEurope and WizzAir have the Bulgarian low cost market to themselves at the moment. Budget carriers were kept away form the Bulgarian aviation market over the past couple of years to preserve the market share of flag carrier Bulgaria Air which is currently undergoing a privatisation procedure. However, Sofia recently signed the open skies agreement that grants all European carriers access to the local market. The document is expected to be ratified by the Bulgarian parliament within a month.

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