Riga – The Latvian national airline airBaltic has been recognized by the web-based service provider ch-aviation as the winner of the Europe's Second Youngest Aircraft Fleet Award 2024 for a second year in a row with an average fleet age of 3.54 years.
Martin Gauss, President and CEO of airBaltic: “We are proud to be recognized for a second year in a row as an airline with one of the most modern aircraft fleet in Europe. Airbus A220-300 has been the backbone of our operations and has played an integral role in the international success story of airBaltic. Being the global launch customer of the Airbus A220-300, we continue to be a proud ambassador of it.”
“Our recent announcement of a firm purchase agreement for 30 Airbus A220-300 aircraft, along with purchase rights for an additional 20 aircraft of the same model, demonstrates our view of this aircraft type as a key competitive advantage,” Martin Gauss added.
Thomas Jaeger, Founder, Owner and CEO of ch-aviation: “We are delighted to be able to present the ch-aviation Europe’s 2nd Youngest Aircraft Fleet Award 2024 to airBaltic for demonstrating the responsibility to tackle the global sustainability challenges in aviation by renewing its fleet and operating Europe’s second youngest fleet operating A220s exclusively now. Its fuel-efficient Airbus A220-300 aircraft significantly contributes to the global effort to reduce CO2 emissions in the aviation industry.”
The ch-aviation Youngest Aircraft Fleet Award recognizes airlines worldwide for keeping their fleet young, modern, and efficient. To determine which airlines currently operate the youngest aircraft fleets, ch-aviation maintains an extensive aircraft database of more than 4 800 active operators, more than 77 000 aircraft, and 2 900 aircraft owners worldwide.
Since the first Airbus A220 joined the company’s fleet in late 2016, airBaltic has carried over 14 200 000 passengers on this aircraft type. So far, A220s have completed more than 157 000 flights and flown above 344 000 block hours.
Since May 2020, airBaltic operates all its flights with a single aircraft type – Airbus A220-300. The aircraft offers an excellent flying experience with such benefits for passengers as wider seats, larger windows, more hand luggage space in the cabin, improved lavatories, and delivering better overall performance, fuel efficiency, and convenience for both passengers and the staff.
In addition, the aircraft is considerably quieter – with twice smaller noise footprint when compared to the previous generation aircraft. Moreover, at the moment it is one of the most efficient commercial aircraft in the world, as it is the first aircraft to have a transparent declaration of the life-cycle environmental impact, helping to reduce CO2 and NOX emissions by 25% and 50%, respectively in comparison to the previous generation aircraft and industry standards.
airBaltic operates more than 100 routes from Riga, Tallinn, Vilnius and Tampere, offering connections to a wide range of destinations in the airline's route network in Europe, the Middle East, North Africa and Caucasus region. A complete schedule of airBaltic flights and tickets are available on the company's homepage at www.airbaltic.com
