ATOR talked about the prospects of summer flights to Turkey

The situation with the cancellation of flights by Turkish airlines is only developing, but it can already be said that with the current planning of the flight program, operators will be in short supply by about 300 thousand seats in the summer. On May 29, ATOR Vice President Artur Muradyan told the Izvestia correspondent about this during the traditional briefing of the Association of Tour Operators of Russia.

"It's not just about the flights of two Turkish carriers. Let me remind you that Russia's main charter carrier, Azur Air, was also told to reduce its flight program by 30%," the expert recalled.

According to him, it is still difficult to assess the consequences for the cost of tours, but it is incorrect to say that this situation will not affect the price now.

"We need to understand one main factor — Turkish carriers fly shorter routes. Their cost is lower than that of Russian transportation. And depending on who these volumes are transferred to, we will understand what will happen to the price," the source said.

Muradyan recalled that Anex Tour has already announced the transfer of its tourists in the regions to Turkish lines and flights of Russian carriers, including Ural Airlines. At the same time, ATOR believes, "the situation is unpleasant for the market," primarily because other carriers have already contracted charter seats for the summer season for other passengers, meaning it will be difficult to "transfer" people from one charter flight to another.

"For example, simply expanding flight programs even to existing designated carriers is also not such an easy action," Muradyan explained.

At the same time, the more carriers serve the destination, the higher the competition, and therefore the lower the prices for the consumer, draw attention to ATOR.

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ATOR employees reported a day earlier that approximately 2.1 thousand tourists from Russia were faced with the cancellation of Air Anka flights on May 26 and 27. Representatives of the Anex travel agency explained that the situation was due to "operational necessity." On May 28, Izvestia published footage from Aerogavan, where thousands of Russians were blocked.

The Russian Ministry of Transport noted on May 29 that tour operators will be obligated to transfer passengers of Air Anka and TailWind airlines, whose operations have been discontinued in the Russian Federation since May 25, to other flights. Now the flight program, which was planned to be implemented before June 16, 2026, will be provided by replacing Air Anka with the national carrier Turkish Airlines and Corendon Airlines.