newstodate.aero

Jul 26, 2023 (newstodate): The US Federal Aviation Administration has granted Latvia with Cat 1 status, clearing the skies for future US-Latvia flights.
   Following an audit of Latvia's Civil Aviation Agency over the last six months, FAA has found its Latvian counterpart in compliance with the regulatory enactments in the civil aviation field of Latvia as to ICAO standards and the quality of the supervision implemented by the CAA.
   With the Latvia's Cat 1 status, Latvian airline operators can now launch future flights to US destinations, as well as cooperate with US carriers.
   Already in September 2022 Martin Gauss, airBaltic CEO, revealed dreams of entering the transatlantic market with direct flights to the USA with new larger aircraft such as the Airbus A321XLR aircraft.
   -We are considering the acquisition of the Airbus A321XLR aircraft, although we also show interest in other smaller long-range aircraft on the market.   
   -The XLR program should be launched in 2025, which seems to be the right time to bring the Airbus A321XLR to Latvia, Mr Gauss told Simple Flying on the sidelines of the 2022 Farnborough Air Show.  
   In 2021, Delta Air Lines and airBaltic applied for DOT approval of a planned code-share agreement initially comprising flights on 24 routes served by airBaltic.
   16 of the code-shared routes will depart from Riga Airport, another five from Tallinn, and the remaining three from Vilnius.
   In all cases, flights will connect to Delta's European hubs at Amsterdam, Munich and Paris, while the proposed agreement will also apply to airBaltic's routes from Riga to Copenhagen, Barcelona and Madrid.
   The Baltic markets were last connected to the USA by airBaltic's earlier code-share agreement with Uzbekistan Airways until March 2018.