Montenegro Airlines and Sky Srpska hold talks on future cooperation

The new found airline of Bosnia and Herzegovina’s entity Republika Srpska, Sky Srpska, is expected to launch flight next year with the help of the government and Serbia’s Jat Airways. Montenegro Airlines will now join the two. Following a meeting between ministers from Republika Sprska and Montenegro Airlines’ CEO the two agreed that flights between Banja Luka and Tivat should be established which would operate at least 4 months per year, since there was satisfactory aircraft occupancy between the two cities when flights were operated on a continual basis in 1999 and 2000. The management of Sky Srpska also spoke with Jat Airways a few days ago regarding potential flights to Tivat, if all necessary licenses could be received. Currently Sky Srpska, with its base in Banja Luka, plans to open services to Belgrade, Pula and Tivat – all of which would be in code share opeartion (once operated by Sky Srpska the other time by a partner airline). It is expected that Sky Srpska would bring back life to Banja Luka Airport. For a few years Republika Srpska had its own airline under the name of Air Srpska, operated by Jat Airways. However when Jat decided to return the two aircraft given to Srpska back to its own base in Belgrade, operations ceased. Read more

Jat Airways and Republika Srpska to launch Sky Srpska in 2009

The Government of Republika Srpska (RS), a Serbian entity in Bosnia and Herzegovina with its main base in Banja Luka is undertaking efforts lately to expand passenger volumes at Banja Luka Airport and launch new services with Jat Airways, the national airline of Serbia, being the main sponsor of its projects and initiatives. The RS transport minister Nedeljko Čubrilović held talks with the general director of Serbia’s national airline, Saša Vlaisavljević today, about the purchase of two aircraft for the recently formed carrier Sky Srpska which would be based in Banja Luka.

The Government of RS recently invited offers for this procurement deal. Čubrilović reminded that RS has had very good collaboration with Jat Airways so far, and the two will discuss the potential for its expansion. There are plans for Jat Airways to lease the two aircraft from Sky Srpska and operate both on their (Jat’s) behalf as well as the behalf of Sky Srpska. Jat Airways is further hoping to completely take over the aviation market in Republika Srpska by commencing new flights from Banja Luka to Pula, Croatia as well as to Tivat, Montenegro from March 2009 if all necessary licenses are gained. Currently Jat Airways operates daily flights from Belgrade to Banja Luka with its ultimate goal being to operate two daily flights. At present the load factors are average with 32 passengers on each flight with the aircraft having a capacity of 72 seats. All seats that are not sold are subsidized to Jat by the government of Republika Srpska. It is expected Sky Srpska will launch in 2009. On Wednesday, September 10, Čubrilović is scheduled to meet with representatives of Montenegrin airports.

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Sky Srpska!

During the last year the government of Republika Srpska, an entity wihin Bosnia and Herzegovina, has announced the creation of its own airline to be named Sky Srpska. The project recently received the green light for the government and new developments have since occurred which could see the airline take off from its base in Banja Luka (pictured above) by the beginning of next year. Yesterday the government of Republika Srpska announced that Sky Srpska would soon receive 2 new, smaller, aircraft for which $24.5 million dollars (USD) will be allocated from the entity’s budget. The two aircraft will have a capacity of 50 seats and will be purchased via credit. The manufacturer of the aircraft has not been chosen however the president of Republika Srpska, Milorad Dodik, a few months ago hinted they could come from the American “General electric”. There is no word on which destinations would be served by the airline although whatever destinations are chosen they will have to wait until next year as it will take time until the aircraft are dispatched to the airline. The CEO of Sky Srpska has announced that future development plan of the airline will soon be made public.

The government hopes to, by starting up Sky Srpska, bring life to Banja Luka Airport which despite its renovated runway, control tower and terminal has extremely low traffic – only served by Serbia’s Jat Airways (to Belgrade), Bosnia’s B&H Airlines (to Zurich) and Austrojet (to Salzburg).

Republika Srpska used to have a national airline from 1999 until 2003. Air Srpska was owned by Jat Airways and used two of its ATR72s for operations to Belgrade, St. Gallen/Altenrhein, Vienna and Zurich. However Jat withdrew its aircraft from the airline in 2003 and therefore all operations ceased. Although Air Srpska was not a large airline, it was extremely unique having major agreements with airlines such as Swiss Air as well as being part of IATA (unusual for a small regional airline) , however this was mostly achieved due to Jat’s lobbying and support. Read more