2019 has been quite a year for Adria Airways. In January in seemed that the carrier had overcome it’s financial problems, at least to the extent it was allowed to keep operating. In February it announced cuts to its summer schedule, and got a new owner. In April a deal with Sukhoi Civil Aircraft Company, which would have seen the Russian company become a strategic partner of Adria, fell through, while in July there was talk of the carrier actually collapsing – after days of cancelled, delayed, and merged flights – with the government announcing contingency plans if this came to pass. The same week saw suspicions raised over Adria Airway’s upcoming financial report, followed a few days later by a claim from managers that the problems at the airline were now being addressed. More recently, pilots at Adria Airways have announced a set of three 3-day strikes, with the first due to start 8 September (2019).
The latest piece of bad news is that Adria had to cancel flights to and from Vienna last night because it was due to be met by a lawyer for the FairPlane compensation claims company, and there was a risk that the aircraft would be seized over an unpaid debt. The €250 debt is in relation to a compensation claim that a court ruled Adria must pay an Austrian passenger on a cancelled charter flight in September 2017, which was due to fly from Cephalonia (Greece) to Graz.
In a press release, FairPlane, acting on behalf of the passenger, stated:
The deadline for the payment expired on Thursday September 5, 2019 so at 19.00 CEST, an executor, police and a lawyer were present at the gate at Vienna Airport. Usually, in such cases, sales from on board duty free, as well as other property belonging to the airline found immediately on site is seized. If nothing can be held or there is resistance from the crew, the executor can impound the aircraft.
According to reports in the Slovenian media, after cancelling last night’s flight Adria transported the passengers between the Slovenian and Austrian capitals by bus. While it remains unclear as to whether Adria has paid the €250 it owes the passenger, this morning the carrier did operate a flight to Vienna.
