OREANDA-NEWS. April 09, 2010. AN-148 regional jet of a new generation carried out the first flight on route Kiev – Budapest of AeroSvit airlines. Besides, from the beginning of summer navigation (from March 28, 2010) this Ukrainian airlines firstly used AN-148 on the route of Odessa-Istanbul and its new directions from Kiev to Vilnius and Moscow Vnukovo airport. In airports of Europe and Russia the aircraft was serviced in nornal mode.

AeroSvit also plans to continue operation of AN-148 on routes to Warsaw, Tbilisi and Saint-Petersburg, on which the Ukrainian regional airplane started fligths in winter this year.

 “From the point of market’s view, AN-148 is the good product, - says Evgenii Treskunov, acting as Director General of AeroSvit airlines, - the aircraft had justified expectations of the airlines on all directions where it was used – both domestic and international. We will be glad to take into commercial operation the second AN-148. Both aircraft will become the good addition to AeroSvit’s fleet, help us to enlarge volumes of work and strengthen our positions in the aviation market”.

Dmytro Kiva, President of ANTONOV Company, says that the second AN-148 will be passed to AeroSvit in the second part of April 2010. “By that time we are preparing the maiden fight of the new 99-seat AN-158 airplane, - he said. – We are sure, it will be able to become the worthy addition to the AN-148 in the fleets of the arlines. Till present, aircraft operators of Ukraine and Russia, countries of Asia, Africa and Latin America expressed their intention to purchase about 70 of such airplanes”.

AeroSvit airlines and ANTONOV company started joint operation of AN-148 on air routes within the Ukraine in summer 2009. Its first flight under AeroSvit’s callsign the aircraft performed on June 2 of the last year on route Kharkov-Kiev. AeroSvit started use AN-148 on the international directions in December 2009.

Two AN-148s work by Russia State Transport Company.

Till present, all three AN-148s performed more than 1000 flights on regular air routes and transported more than 45000 passengers.