“As for the number of departures, it was 4% higher than in the first quarter of last year, about 11,500,” Tarom officials said. In other words, there were 64 departures from the airports in the country on average per day, according to ZF’s calculations.
While Tarom increased its traffic by 8% in the first quarter, low cost rival Wizz Air, the leader of the local market, introduced new routes and posted 20% rise in passenger numbers. Wizz Air’s chief executive officer Jozsef Varadi, has recently told ZF he expects the number of passengers in Romania to reach 5.5 million to 6 million by yearend, compared with 4.5 million in 2015. Wizz Air flies from nine airports in Romania – Bucharest, Suceava, Iasi, Targu-Mures, Constanta, Cluj-Napoca, Sibiu, Timisoara and Craiova.
Low cost airline Ryanair, too, introduced new flights on domestic routes, previously served only by Tarom. Ryanair expects 10 million passengers in five years.
Another rival of Tarom on its home market is Romanian-held Blue Air, which carried 2 million passengers last year and consolidated its position through new destinations.
(English version by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)