Another flight from Budapest cancelled for good
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Péter Szijjártó, Hungary’s foreign minister, was very pleased to announce the new pair of flights connecting Budapest with a Central Asian capital. However, it seems that realities did not meet the expectations, and the airline cancelled the flight’s operation within only two weeks. Here is the reason why.
According to Menedzsment Fórum, a Hungarian business news outlet, the Budapest-Tashkent direct route only had three return flights. Based on the original promises of the Hungarian foreign minister, it should have increased the two-per-week frequency to three per week from next January. Instead, there will be none next week.
The first take-off was two weeks ago, while the last one appeared in Flightradar’s database with a 12.30 am departure yesterday. However, on the official site of Budapest Airport, the flight was unavailable. Furthermore, the call centre of the air gate confirmed to mfor.hu that they did not only cancel yesterday’s flights but all the scheduled operations between Budapest and Tashkent operated by Qanot Sharq. Thus, the direct connection between the Hungarian and Uzbek has been ceased.
The inauguration of that flight was purely political rather than market-driven. It reminds me how, post-independence, Croatia set up flights to Israel, in an effort to counter the allegations its new administration was flirting with neo-Nazism. The flights bombed, no pun intended, because there was practically no demand from actual customers but the Croatia government kept them going for years with enormous subsidies. And there you have it: If it’s geostrategically and politically important, throw taxpayers’ $$$ at it; if not, let the market be the judge…