Tehran,Iran, July 26
Trend:
“In the first quarter of the current Iranian year (started on March 21 ,2019), a total number of 218,900 flights were operated in the country, which is 14 percent less than last year, due to the US sanctions, an Iranian Aviation Official told Trend.
“In terms of number of passengers, the figures for the current year are not available yet, while nearly 26 million passenger were transported via flights last year,” said Secretary of Iran's Aviation Companies Association Maghsoud Asadi Samani.
"The reason for the decline is the economic situation, increase of the exchange rates as a result of sanctions, as well as growth of the departure tax rates," he said.
He announced the national airline companies can transport up to 30 million passengers a year.
“The price of each flight ticket is between $40 and $50 for airlines, and the profit the companies gain is rather small. Due to increase of the exchange rates and of the operational costs, airlines have no choice but to raise the ticket price," he added.
Speaking about recent success of technicians Iran Air to repair Airbus A300-600 in less than a day, he said that local aviation technicians are qualified to repair any kind of aircraft, while previously the industry depended on foreign specialists.