Air Lituanica has operating license revoked; airBaltic to take over flights

  • 2015-05-22
  • from wire reports and TBT staff, VILNIUS

The Civil Aviation Administration (CAA) has assessed the finances of Lithuanian airline Air Lituanica and decided it is unable to meet its financial obligations. 

According to the CAA,  Air Lituanica's operating licence will be revoked as of 23 May, pending the submission of additional information regarding the company's ability to carry out activities. The CAA based its decision on poor financial indicators of the company, seeking to prevent possible flight safety risks or damages to passengers.

The CAA's statement read that shareholders of the company had previously fulfilled their financial obligations, including  constant financing of the company's activities, and had promised that the fulfilment of their financial obligations would continue. However they have changed their position recently, and so the company faced a lack of working capital. Following the CAA's request, Air Lituanica provided certain guarantees that in case of its activities being terminated passengers would be safeguarded from damages.

Air Lituanica will operate flights from/to Amsterdam, Paris and Tallinn today, while flights today's flights to/from Berlin, Prague, Brussels and Stockholm have been cancelled.'

Air Lituanica has agreed with Latvian national airlines airBaltic that all passengers who have Air Lituanica tickets for cancelled flights between 22 May and 29 May will be rebooked on airBaltic flights to their original destinations, according to a statement from the company.

Meanwhile, airBaltic has since announce that it will replace Air Lituanica flights and rescue passengers affected by the suspension of operations. 

“Our home market for airBaltic is Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia. We will consolidate and strengthen our service in our home market by offering more direct flights. We have announced the first direct routes out of Vilnius to Western and Northern Europe today and will evaluate additional ones gradually. We will rescue stranded passengers in the first days following the suspension of flights, and will offer special rescue fares for customers who booked flights for later in the summer,'' the airline's CEO Martin Gauss said.

airBaltic also announced today the immediate opening of new direct routes from Vilnius to Brussels, Berlin, Paris, Stockholm, Warsaw and Helsinki. These will be in addition to the Vilnius – Amsterdam, and Vilnius –Riga routes which the company already runs.