The United Arab Emirates airline flydubai will start operations at the Riga International Airport on December 12 this year, offering nonstop flights between Riga and Dubai three times per week, airport representatives have told the LETA news agency.
Flights will enable passengers from Latvia and the Baltic region to travel to Dubai and beyond on the flydubai flight network. Also available will be flights on the Emirates Airlines network, which has a codeshare agreement with flydubai.
Jeyhun Efendi is divisional senior vice president for commercial operations and E-commerce at flydubai, and he says that Europe remains an important market for the airline. “We are excited to expand our network there with the launch of flights to Riga,” he explains adding that this will offer passengers greater opportunities to explore Dubai, the Persian Gulf region, and further destinations along the flydubai network, including Kenya, the Maldives, Tanzania, Thailand and Sri Lanka.
Riga Airport board chairwoman Laila Odina points out that the addition of the new carrier will improve existing connections to one of the world’s most important aviation hubs whilst also introducing a new level of service standards along this route.
In addition to Riga, flydubai has also announced new flights to and from Chisinau in Moldova from September 17, to and from Iasi in Romania from September 19, and to and from the Lithuanian capital of Vilnius as of September 19.
The airport notes that flydubai offers flights to more than 135 destinations in 58 countries, more than 100 of which previously had no nonstop links to Dubai. The airline has 88 Boeing 737 aircraft in its fleet.
The flydubai airline had originally planned nonstop flights between Riga and Dubai from October 2024, but last August the airline announced that it was forced to cancel the plan because of delays in the delivery of new aircraft.
As LETA has reported in the past, the Riga airport handled 7.12 million passengers last year, up 7% against 2023, but 8.7% fewer than in 2019.
The Riga International Airport is the largest air hub in the Baltic States.
Source: BNS
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