Low-cost airline Ryanair opened its base at Zagreb Airport on Friday, announcing that it expected to increase the number of its aircraft from the present one to three by the end of the year and bring about 700,000 passengers by April 2022.

Speaking at a press conference, Ryanair CEO Eddie Wilson said that Zagreb had great potential for their business development and that, with investment of $300 million, they hoped to turn it into an even stronger tourist destination.

He said that during the winter flight schedule Ryanair would operate 60 flights out of Zagreb a week to 24 foreign destinations, including nine new ones. In summer, the airline connects Zagreb with 15 European destinations.

We want to fly all year round and improve our business in Croatia. We have our bases in Zadar and Zagreb, and we also fly to Pula where we are seeing very good results, Wilson said.

Asked if he thought that the inclusion of Croatia’s Adriatic coast in the orange zone on the COVID-19 map of the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) would hurt the tourism industry, he said that this is less important and that more important is how many people in the country have been vaccinated.

This summer we expect a longer season than last year, in Croatia too, which is now in a good situation, and we hope it will stay that way, Wilson said.