Moldova has been in the midst of European geopolitical turbulences as of late. While the situation is not as dire as in its Northwestern neighbor, Ukraine, the war has had its toll in the landlocked country — and in its aviation sector particularly.
In the latest development, early this week, Hungarian ultra low-cost carrier (ULCC) Wizz Air announced it would be withdrawing from the country, after closing its operational base in Chișinău last December.
The withdrawal will have effect from March 14th, according to the airline, ”as a result of recent developments in Moldova and the high, but not imminent, risk in the countries’ airspace”, in a press release republished by Romania’s business news website Economica.net.
The website says after the final date, Wizz will offer additional flights from its base in Iași, Romania, which stands near the border with Moldova, around three hours away from Chișinău by car.
Moldova’s airspace has been shut twice over the last two years. First immediately after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine; then, briefly on February 14, 2023, due to a “presumed air balloon” entering its territory.
”Wizz Air remains committed to the Moldovan market and loyal to its customers”, said the press release. “Wizz Air will constantly reevaluate the situation to restart operations and to reopen the base, once this can be made safely”.
Moldova, however, remains served by other foreign companies, which so far have not noticed the worsening of safety conditions on and off the country. When asked by the Romanian service of American-funded Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, both Austrian Airlines and an unidentified Romanian airline seconded this position.
“We understand and see the risks related to Transnistria [the breakaway state in Northeastern Moldova, ed.], they are not new”, said the Romanian source. “It’s a unilateral decision and we don’t see any explanation other than the commercial one”.
Romanian aviation news website BoardingPass.ro also affirmed, in an opinion piece, that safety may not have been the only consideration upon withdrawing from Moldova — arguing that otherwise the airline would not have waited for two weeks until the last flight.
The website remarked that cancelling flights more than 15 days before does not, under European regulation, oblige Wizz to compensate the affected passengers.
With the withdrawal of Wizz Air — the second-largest airline in Moldova, according to data by Cirium’s Diio Mi application — airlines are scrambling to replace capacity to and from the country.
HiSky, a private Moldovan airline founded in 2021, announced this Friday the launch of the Chișinău-Rome/Fiumicino route. According to a press release, the company expects to start the twice-weekly operations by April 6th, a relatively short notice for a new route.
“Rome was found in practically 80% of requests from HiSky passengers, Bessarabians in particular”, stated HiSky’s General Director, Iulian Scorpan. “Precisely for this reason, together with my colleagues, we made the greatest effort to include this route in our schedule, as we know very well that Italy is the country where we have a good part of the diaspora”.
HiSky celebrated, yesterday, its second anniversary of operations; it expects to carry 1.3 million passengers this year — and it will receive, under its Romanian business unit, the country’s first two A321LRs. The airline also mentions “solid perspectives for a third aircraft [addition]” this year. If it does not, it could end 2023 with one Airbus A319, four A320 and the two A321LR.
On the other hand, Air Moldova, the country’s largest airline, has been struggling as of late to operate the flights it already has — never mind filling the void left by Wizz Air.
In the past week, the airline has cancelled several of its flights. Of its fleet of four aircraft, two are “unavailable” and a third is on scheduled maintenance, it stated in a Facebook post this Friday, where it said that “it is a difficult period for our team and for [passengers]”.
