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'Air Slovakia' is an airline based in Bratislava, Slovakia. It operates scheduled and charter passenger flights from Bratislava.

Contents

History

Purchase

Destinations

Scheduled services

Charter services

ACMI and ad-hoc charter services

Fleet

External links

References

History

The airline was established on 2 June 1993 with the name of Air Terrex Slovakia and started operations on 1 July 1993. This became Air Terrex after the separation of the Czech Republic and Slovakia. The main aim was to fill the gap in Slovak aviation left by the departure of CSA. The first regular scheduled flight was Bratislava to Tel Aviv started in January 1994. The name Air Slovakia was adopted in 1995. Originally Boeing 727 aircraft were in the fleet. They were later replaced by more modern Boeing 737-200 aircraft and since 2003, Boeing 757-200 were part of the fleet. ^[2].

Purchase

The airline was purchased by Indian businessman Harjinder Singh Sidhu in October 2006 ^[3]
Harjinder Singh Sidhu, the Sikh businessman who has quietly amassed a fortune in London’s East End. According to The Sunday Times "This month, Sidhu, 56, took control of ailing Air Slovakia, and will inject $30m (£16m) into it over the next three years to buy aircraft, develop new routes and promote it as the flag carrier of the world’s widely travelled Sikhs and Punjabis. Why would they want to travel via Bratislava? It is well connected to the rest of Europe by Ryanair and others, to Vienna, to Germany. Customers pay £20 for a ticket to Bratislava and then get a direct flight to Amritsar for £200-£300 return, he said. Sidhu argues that Britain’s 500,000 Sikhs and Punjabis will gladly make the detour to travel home via Slovakia if they can enjoy the comfort of Punjabi food, music and films and be served by Punjabi flight attendants.He is planning new flights to Delhi, Goa and Ahmedabad in Gujarat, new European destinations and a code-sharing deal with a leading Indian domestic airline. Sidhu said his acquisition of Air Slovakia was a boyhood dream come true and highlighted how far he had risen since he arrived in London as a 16-year-old from Patiala in the Punjab. As a kid I always dreamt of owning an airline. When that dream comes true, you don’t want to mess up the chance. Last December he was appointed general sales agent for Air Slovakia in Italy, India and Britain and within three months was effectively controlling the company. In February they had a financial setback — one of their planes was hit by a bird and damaged. They didn’t have enough money to replace it. I injected $2m in February and got them out of the problem. In March, as a payback, they made me a financial director, he said. Later he struck a deal to become the proud owner of a company with turnover of $30m. I won’t borrow money. I have enough to back my plans, said Sidhu. “I should have gone on the rich list a long time ago, but I stopped it. I don’t want to say what I’m worth. I want to keep it under wraps and not have the taxman on me. My kids are good, intelligent kids. They are my wealth — in that sense I’m rich. God looks after me." ^[4]

Destinations

Scheduled services

This is a list of Air Slovakia's scheduled destinations (as of May 2007):

Asia

★ India

★
★ Amritsar (Raja Sansi International Airport)

★ Israel

★
★ Tel Aviv (Ben Gurion International Airport)

★ Kuwait

★
★ Kuwait City (Kuwait International Airport)

Europe

★ Cyprus

★
★ Larnaca (Larnaca International Airport)

★ Italy

★
★ Milan/Bergamo (Orio al Serio Airport)

★ Slovakia

★
★ Bratislava (M. R. Štefánik Airport) 'Hub'

★ United Kingdom

★
★ Birmingham (Birmingham International Airport)

Charter services

Charter services in summer 2007 are operated as follows:
From Bratislava (M. R. Štefánik Airport) to:

★ Antalya

★ Athens

★ Bodrum

★ Bourgas

★ Dalaman

★ Heraklion

★ Hurghada

★ Chania

★ Ibiza

★ Kavala

★ Korfu

★ Kos

★ Larnaca

★ Menorca

★ Mytilene

★ Palma de Mallorca

★ Patras/Araxos

★ Rhodos

★ Samos

★ Sharm el Sheikh

★ Taba

★ Tivat

★ Thessaloniki

★ Zakynthos
From Košice (Košice International Airport) to:

★ Antalya

★ Heraklion

★ Hurghada

★ Chania

★ Ibiza

★ Korfu

★ Kos

★ Rhodos

★ Thessaloniki

★ Zakynthos
From Brno (Brno-Tuřany Airport) to:

★ Heraklion

★ Kos

★ Rhodos

★ Zakynthos
From Debrecen (Debrecen International Airport) to:

★ Zakynthos

ACMI and ad-hoc charter services

Air Slovakia flies the following route with Boeing 737-200 F-GIXA on ACMI contract on behalf of VoliAmo: Brescia - Catania - Cagliari - Brescia.
The airline also operates ACMI on behalf of other carriers, mainly SkyEurope Airlines, Travel Service and Wizzair, but also others. It also flies occasionally for the Slovak army.
See http://www.airportbratislava.sk, http://www.slovak-airports.net, http://www.airslovakia.sk and http://www.voliamo.net for more details

Fleet

The Air Slovakia fleet consists of the following aircraft (at May 2007):

★ 2 Boeing 737-200 OM-RAN, F-GIXA

★ 1 Boeing 737-300 OM-ASC

★ 2 Boeing 757-200 OM-ASA, OM-ASB
The airline also uses aircraft from other carriers, in summer 2007 these are:

★ 1 Airbus 320-200 (operated by Lotus Air) SU-LBI

★ 1 Boeing 737-300 (operated by AirClass Airways) EC-JXD

External links

★ Air Slovakia

★ Air Slovakia Fleet

References

1. Airline Codes
2. Air Slovakia webpage
3. BBC, U.K., "Fly Air Slovakia for Punjabi experience " 13 October 2006
4. The Sunday TImes, U.K., "Air Slovakia ... the Sikh airline" 22 October 2006