The Czech airline Smartwings intends to reactivate the flight connection between Prague and St. Petersburg on April 29, 2021. This should initially be served on Thursday and Sunday. For reasons of route law, however, you have to resort to a remarkable construction.

The subsidiary CSA had to go a few weeks ago Register for bankruptcy. The future of the former flag carrier of the former Czechoslovakia hangs by a thread. As a precaution, the entire workforce has already been taken the termination pronounced. But now Smartwings needs the subsidiary, because it has the appropriate route rights for Prague-St. Petersburg.

Therefore a kind of “virtual codeshare” is created. On paper, these are CSA flights that are operationally operated by Smartwings. The aircraft are Boeing 737-800s. However, the connection is marketed as Smartwings flights and corresponding flight numbers have been created. In the medium term, the lowcoster wants to seek the rights for flights to Russia itself, which in the case of St. Petersburg will not be a particularly high hurdle. The form in which the CSA subsidiary can be continued depends on the Decisions of the court and the creditors.