A Canadian airline has announced its return to the Croatian market as of May 2021, Vecernji List daily says in its Thursday issue, noting that in 2020 Croatia was left without almost all intercontinental lines.

Croatian airports this year saw a huge drop in the number of passengers just like other airports around the world due to the coronavirus pandemic. Airlines worldwide share the same fate.

As many as 11.4 million passengers passed through domestic airports in 2019, and the year was a record one also owing to numerous intercontinental lines.

This year the country has been left without almost all intercontinental lines and next year will not be any better either.

Aviation expert Gojko Mavrinac, who owns a portal specialising in aviation, croatianaviation.com, believes that next summer Croatia could be connected with Canada again with a direct flight. Until this year, there were as many as two direct flights to Canada during the summer, one operated by AirTransat and the other by Air Canada Rouge.

Mavrinac says that Air Canada Rouge has released for sale tickets for Zagreb for next summer. He also notes that talks are underway on the sale of AirTransat to Air Canada and if a deal is closed, the line to Zagreb will be operated only by AirTransat as the company specialises in tourist travel and leisure destinations.

AirTransat has told croatianaviation.com that it plans to resume its Toronto-Zagreb service as of 11 May 2021, the daily says.