Eastern Europe Property

British Airways will launch regular flights from Bulgaria’s Black Sea center of Varna to London March 29.

The pre-launch price of the return ticket is set at EUR 150. After the company starts to service the flights, the price will increase to EUR 200.

Initially the flights will be carried out twice a week – on Wednesdays and Saturdays. As of June 6, the company will fly planes four times a week.

Norwegian budget airline Air Shuttle will launch flights to Bulgaria’s Black Sea in May this year.

The airline will service the flights on Saturdays during the high summer season from the Black Sea airports of Varna and Burgas to the Norwegian capital, Oslo. The ticket price during this period is set at EUR 74, airport fees included.

In August ticket prices to Oslo will range from EUR 74-99, while the return ticket will vary between EUR 94 and 185, airport fees included.

Norwegian Air Shuttle AS is a low-fare, point-to-point airline, registered on the Oslo Stock Exchange. It operates a total of 55 routes – nine domestic and 46 international routes from different cities in Norway to European cities. Norwegian has 14 aircraft of Boeing 737-300 with 148 seats.

The new airstrip for Sofia airport will be operational by the middle of summer 2006, authorities announced after Transport Minister Petar Mutafchiev visited the construction site on Wednesday.

February 2006 was the deadline for the completion of the strip, but the construction would not be ready in time.

Sofia Airport’s CEO Kalin Barzov explained that the airstrip’s composition was completed and 2,500 meters of the strip have been built during the past three months. It would be 3,600 meters long and the airplanes would lift off a kilometer earlier compared to the old strip. This would decrease the sound pollution significantly, Barzov said. The lighting and connections between the new and old strip are yet to be constructed.

The new airport terminal is also almost ready and it would be operational before the airstrip, probably in the beginning of the summer.

When asked, Mutafchiev explained that all contract parties that are culpable of slowing down the construction works would be sanctioned.

12th Oct 2005 Sofia Echo
German airline Lufthansa will commence regular Sofia-Dusseldorf-Sofia flights as of the beginning of November.

Dieter Grosse, Lufthansa regional manager for Bulgaria, announced also that the flights will be operated every day, except from Saturdays.

The company will also double its Sofia- Frankfurt flights launching one in the morning and one in the afternoon, on a daily basis.

Passengers can use also the flights linking Sofia and Munchen executed three times per day.

Lufthansa occupies one of leading places on the Bulgarian airline market with a share of 15%, Grosse said.

VARNA AIRPORT COUNTS 1.5 MILLION PASSENGERS
10th Oct 2005 – Sofia Echo

The airport in Bulgaria’s main coastal city welcomed its 1.5-millionth passenger for this year.

The lucky arriver was a woman from Finland headed to the coastal resort of Golden Sands.

By the end of the year, another 90,000 are expected to visit Varna Airport, according to its CEO Yanko Yankov.

But the number achieved so far already exceeds last year’s by 16%.

Last year, the Varna terminals saw 1.3 million travellers.