With Saab 340s leased from Sprint Air, Croatian airline Trade Air plans to reactivate subsidized domestic flights on Thursday. Previously, the date for the resumption had been repeatedly pushed back.
In May 2022, Trade Air announced the temporary suspension of flights offered within Croatia. Background: The subsidy contracts have expired and there have been several delays in the tender process. The carrier has therefore pushed back the date for the resumption. The Croatian government had hoped that other carriers would contact Croatia Airlines and Trade Air. But that was not the case, so the PSO contracts went back to the two providers.
Trade Air will receive around 24 million euros for the operation of a total of six routes for four years. The domestic flights are still not operated by the company itself, but rely on wet lease aircraft. The operational implementation is therefore carried out by the Polish Sprint Air with turboprop machines of the type Saab 340. These are to be used for Trade Air on the following routes: Osijek - Zagreb - Osijek, Osijek - Pula - Split - Pula - Osijek, Osijek - Rijeka - Osijek, Rijeka - Split - Dubrovnik - Split - Rijeka, Osijek - Zadar - Osijek and Rijeka - Zadar - Rijeka.