Belarus’s Belavia resumes Baku, extends other suspensions

Belavia (B2, Minsk National) has extended the suspensions of a number of its operations due to ongoing travel restrictions across Europe and the Commonwealth of Independent States, the Belarusian news agency BelTA reported. Flights between Minsk National and Riga are now out of action until January 31, 2021, the latest in a series of postponements to the Latvian capital, while Tallinn Lennart Meri and Larnaca have been shelved until at least December 14. Operations to Ashgabat will not resume until January 1, and there will be no flights to either Budapest or Almaty until March 27, 2021. Flights to all points in Russia except Moscow Domodedovo have been suspended until December 24 on the orders of the Russian Federation. However, Belavia resumed its flights to Baku on December 3 according to Belarusian and Azerbaijani media, operating to the Azerbaijani capital 4x weekly. ch-aviation analysis of Flightradar24 ADS-B data shows that one of the carrier’s eight B737-800s made the journey on that date, the first time the airline operated the route since September 26. Meanwhile, the first of three leased E195-E2s, Belavia’s first Embraer E2 jets, will arrive in Minsk on December 24, with the other two scheduled for delivery as planned in March and April 2021, the Sputnik news agency reported on December 3. The routes the aircraft will be deployed on are not yet known, but Flightradar24 data for the Baku route already shows the E195 as its aircraft type. According to the ch-aviation capacities module, factoring in the above changes, Belavia has 31 routes scheduled from Minsk for the week of December 7 to 13.