The boss of Wizz Air has renewed calls for larger airlines to stop blocking airport take-off and landing slots as rows intensify over carriers operating “ghost flights” to protect flying rights.
Jozsef Varadi, chief executive of the ambitious short-haul operator, claimed that rules over flying slots from airports were being “protected for the benefit of legacy carriers” and that this was “a way of distorting the market further by allowing access to certain airlines at the detriment to others who could actually do more there, more efficiently”.
European aviation rules state that airlines must use at least 80 per cent of their take-off and landing slots at airports or give up their flying rights. These use-it-or-lose-it rules were relaxed during the pandemic so as