Airline operator Carpatair, led by businessman Nicolae Petrov, will focus more on domestic flights next year, by introducing new routes, as well as by doubling the frequency of some of the current flights.
"Since only part of our flights to Timisoara are domestic flights, the share of domestic passengers in the overall traffic does not exceed 8%. For next year, however, we intend to introduce new domestic flights, with domestic traffic to reach around 15% of the overall traffic," said Nicolae Petrov, one of the company's shareholders and chairman of Carpatair. The company estimates it will have a traffic of 600,000 passengers, 20% more than in 2006. The number of passengers carried by Carpatair on domestic flights is set to reach 48,000 people this year.
In order to double the share of domestic traffic in 2008, to 15%, the company, which is based in Timisoara, will introduce flights to Cluj-Napoca, Sibiu and Bacau, and will double the frequency of flights to Craiova-Constanta, as well as to Satu Mare and Suceava.
Carpatair operates 4 flights domestically, all from Timisoara, to Bucharest, Suceava, Iasi and Craiova-Constanta. The operator has developed its domestic flights year after year, introducing the flight to Suceava in 2006, and the Timisoara-Craiova route this year.
Carpatair's main competitor in terms of domestic flights is TAROM, but the two operators are not in direct competition on many routes, since Carpatair has its hub in Timisoara, which is the departure point for all domestic flights.
At present, Carpatair operates 450 flights per week, and will add another 30 flights next year. Apart from domestic routes, the company also plans to introduce a destination in Ukraine in the 2008 summer season, which will most likely be Odessa, and to strengthen its presence on the Greek market by increasing the number of flights to Athens and by launching the Timisoara-Salonic route.
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