Australia's newest airline, Bonza, is still awaiting CASA approval to fly, with no set date for starting flights
New budget airline Bonza is promising some of the cheapest flights in Australia, but more than six months after it hoped to have planes in the sky, the company's take-off date is still unclear. Plans for the start-up carrier were revealed in October 2021 with hopes it would be operating by the middle of this year.
But after repeated delays, the airline is still navigating regulatory approvals with the Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA) to obtain its Air Operator's Certificate.
Bonza chief executive Tim Jordan said he was unsure when flights would begin but was confident demand would be there when they did.
"This is the first new high-capacity airline in Australia for 15 years, and obviously the process associated with signing that off is quite thorough," Mr Jordan said.
"Once we believe we are ready, we will reach out to the regulator and ask for them to come and make sure that is absolutely the case."
Bonza will offer a 27-route network across 17 mostly regional locations in Queensland, New South Wales, and Victoria.
Mr Jordan said the airline would acquire up to eight aircraft in its first year of operation.
"Our significant point of difference really is that of our initial 27 routes, 25 of them are not flown by the other operators," he said.
"We will be offering very low fares in the market and it's something which is desperately wanted across many, many regional areas."
"We would expect approximately that cost of flying for passengers shouldn't be much more than about $50 an hour."
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