Viva Air: Avianca will bring stranded Argentines left by low cost in Colombia

Airline company Avianca will bring Argentinians stranded in Colombia due to the suspension of low-cost flights in the Viva Air crisis, which this Tuesday announced the suspension of its services, pending the approval of the merger with Avianca. More than 150 customers were affected by the cancellation of flights between Argentina and Colombia.

In place on the line by Alive, no longer available for sale tickets airlines to the destinations where you flew both in Colombia and in other countries. Company He called affected passengers to enter their mesh for more information or, if they prefer, await instructions from the Colombian aviation regulatory body, Aeronáutica Civil, which has publicly stated that it will implement plans to help affected users.

Avianca and Latam will transport passengers stranded on Viva Air

In that sense, It was reported by Avianca will transfer passengers with a confirmed reservation to a Viva flight on February 27 and 28 and March 1. They will be moved, free of charge and in order of arrivalon its scheduled flights that are still available and other new ones that it has just added to its schedule, with additional offer of 4000 places.

At the same time, the airline will temporarily use larger capacity aircraft. Regarding Argentina, Itineraries will be operated in a two-ship fleet of the Boeing 787 family, which has another 70 seats for a total of 250 passengers.

Aid is reaching destinations served by the Colombian airline that have been distributed with low pricealso of Colombian originuntil close of business this Monday. Viva, which arrived in the country in June with the intention of taking Argentinians to the Caribbean and Miami, connected Buenos Aires with its hubs from Medellin and Bogota. Now, Avianca will carry affected passengers on its flights between the Colombian capital and Ezeiza International Airport.

As the company explained, Those interested can arrange the order at the airports. "After Civil Aeronautics activated mechanisms for airlines to protect customers affected by the Viva crisis, Avianca has voluntarily made its network of routes and seats available to customers so that affected Viva customers can fulfill their travel plans.He said in a statement released this afternoon.

Except, Avianca will temporarily close its sales on routes within Colombia due to the re-accommodation of Viva passengers. "Today, it doesn't matter what color our logo is, the priority is to help them. For this reason, we make available a comprehensive plan. We will evaluate additional actions to continue to guarantee connectivity at this time", he asserted Frederico Pedreira, Head of department (COO) of Avianca.

Those interested in traveling with Avianca will be able to manage the order at the airports.

Eye, Adrian Neuhauser, the company's president and CEO, said: "Now it is it's time for us as an industry to help the hundreds of thousands of affected passengers a crisis that could obviously have been avoided. Aerocivil has provided mechanisms to protect users and our task is to make all capacities available for this. We are contributing our resources to serve affected passengers".

"The Viva crisis undoubtedly represents a risk to the stability of the aviation sector and directly affects the regions that depend exclusively on it as the sole operator, your center operations in Antioquia, its dynamic development and more than 5,000 direct and indirect jobs created at low costs," he said.

It is now it's time for us as an industry to help the hundreds of thousands of affected passengers a crisis that could obviously have been avoided

While, Latam Airlines will do the same, but in this case support will be limited to passengers who planned to fly Viva between Colombia and Perusince the airline of Chilean origin currently has no routes between Argentina and Colombia.

"passengers from tickets until March 2 and who are affected by the suspension of flights of the above company for an indefinite period can receive free protection from Latam in free seats available on flights operated by Latam Airlines Colombia and/or Latam Airlines Peru on the same routes, provided that they are domestic flights within Colombia or Peru or direct international flights between Colombia and Peru", reported.

Viva Air has temporarily suspended all its flights

The suspension of Viva flights took place in the midst of the financial debacle the company is going through Given the delay by the Colombian regulatory authority in approving their merger: the company accuses Aeronáutica Civil of delaying the approval of the integration with Avianca.

"Viva has been forced to announce the suspension of its operations effective immediately. After more than seven months of delay, The Colombian government has been presented with numerous evidences showing that it is in a critical situation, ensuring that the only way it can continue to fly is for Civil Aeronautics to allow it to become part of a stronger airline group," he reported this morning.

"Viva did not take this drastic step as a strategy to pressure the government. It took it because, as we warned the public about the interests for months, our reality is that we are in a financial crisis. High officials knew this decision firsthand not only in the pleas made before taking. In multiple communication, the seriousness and inevitability of this decision was expressed", pointed out the air.

And he explained that "No matter how many attempts were made to speak to the director of Civil Aeronautics, Sergio París, he never responded to multiple SOS calls." "Even Castlesouth, the political rights holder of Viva, has made similar communications in recent weeks to various officials to indicate that, without an urgent decision, Viva still had hours to live", he added.

Viva did not take this drastic step as a strategy to pressure the government. It was taken because our reality is that we are in a financial crisis.

"Viva had confidence that the Government would make a decision, but after months of waiting, they changed the rules of the game and now blame us for reaching a conclusion that we had been warning about for seven months. We want to be fierce: We repeat that this is a situation that Viva tried to avoid at all costs, so that the passengers would not be uncomfortable," the airline said.

This Monday, the first sign of what was later confirmed. Live suspended domestic connections with Barranquilla, Cartagena and Cali, and canceled flights to Argentina, Peru and Brazil, which the sector interpreted as a symptom of closing operations.

There was another precedent with the departure of the chief executive officer and president, the Argentine Félix Antel, who previously passed through Latam and piloted Vivo from 2018 until last week. As revealed, executive authority He decided to leave his position because of the aviation crisis and the delay of civil aviation.