FlyBosnia To Relaunch Operations With Two Hi Fly Airbus Aircraft

FlyBosnia is back, and it is gearing up to launch scheduled operations. The airline leased two aircraft, an Airbus A320 and an A321 from Hi Fly, and it already operated one charter flight to Egypt.

FlyBosnia currently has no aircraft, but it plans to have eight in just two years. Photo: Anna Zvereva via Wikimedia

FlyBosnia leases two aircraft

FlyBosnia, the privately owned self-styled flag carrier of Bosnia and Herzegovina, is getting ready to restart operations again. The airline has leased two aircraft from Portugal’s Hi Fly, Flying Bosnian reports, with which it will operate scheduled passenger services and cargo flights this summer.

The first aircraft to arrive was a 24-year old Airbus A320-232 (TC-OBU) that was delivered to FlyBosnia in April this year, having previously been with Onur Air of Turkey.

The second aircraft is a 22-year old Airbus A321-200 (CS-TRJ) that was delivered this month. It features 153 seats in a three-class configuration: four seats in First Class, 12 in Business Class, and 137 seats in Economy.

Unlike the A320, FlyBosnia’s Airbus A321 is already flying. Our data from RadarBox.com indicates that it operated a flight from Bosnia’s capital, Sarajevo, to Hurghada in Egypt last week Thursday, 17th June. This was FlyBosnia’s first revenue flight this year.

FlyBosnia previously had two Airbus A319 aircraft. Photo: FlyBosnia

FlyBosnia is making money again

Last week’s flight from Sarajevo to Hurghada marked the resumption of flying for FlyBosnia, which has been a virtual airline for a year now. It also marked FlyBosnia’s first revenue-generating flight in a while.

The airline was supposed to resume regular scheduled passenger services last week, but no flights actually took place. FlyBosnia was due to start operating flight 6W101 yesterday, Sunday 20th June, between Sarajevo and Riyadh in Saudi Arabia. But the flight did not take off.

Instead, FlyBosnia’s website is now showing that flights will begin this week Sunday, 27th June, under a different code. They are due to operate on Thursdays and Sundays as follows:

• Flight 5K3710 departing SJJ at 11:00 and arriving in RUH at 16:40
• Flight 5K3720 departing RUH at 18:10 and arriving in SJJ at 22:10

This route, between Sarajevo and Riyadh, is currently the only route showing on FlyBosnia’s website for which tickets are available for purchase. It appears that the airline will be relying on charter flights more than previously for the foreseeable future.

Gulf Air will start flying to Sarajevo this week, as will Jazeera Airways and Kuwait Airways. Photo: Airbus

FlyBosnia used to have its own fleet

Not so far ago, FlyBosnia used to have a fleet of two Airbus A319 aircraft with which it operated several scheduled routes, including to London Luton. Once upon a time, the airline even had plans to start flying to Zurich and Moscow.

However, this all fell through with the outbreak of the pandemic. FlyBosnia has not operated a scheduled service with its own metal since February 2020. It operated some services with a wet-leased aircraft from a Lithuanian ACMI company in the summer of 2020, but it then entered hibernation again for the whole of autumn 2020, winter 2020/2021, and spring 2021.

Do you think FlyBosnia will start flying again this summer? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below.

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