Ministry of Transport, Information Technology and Communications

Varna Airport presented the extensions of its passenger terminals today, in the presence of the Minister of Transport Peter Mutafchiev, the Minister of Interior Rumen Petkov, the parliament deputies Peter Dimitrov and Apostol Dimitrov, the mayors of Varna Municipality Kiril Yordanov and Aksakovo Municipality Atanas Stoilov, the chairman of the municipality council – Varna Borislav Guzanov, the deputy district governor of District Varna Ivo Seferov, air and tour-operator companies representatives.

During the presentation the director-executive of “Varna Airport” Ltd. Janko Jankov described the main investments in the modernization and the extension of the airport in the last three months:

• Varna Airport has three terminals to serve the arriving passengers. The new Terminal 5 is the biggest one, separated on an area of 2000 quadrate meters. Actually, it disposes of the largest hall to welcome the arrival passengers. Its opening will easy the work on serving the travelers in peak time, In the active summer season, when the number of the flights is usually over 100 a day;
• after the inside reconstruction and modernization, the departure area in the zone behind the custom and border control has been increased with approximately 40%. Fast food restaurant and attractive child-spot have also been built;
• In order to increase the service precision of the leaving passengers, five new automated check-in equipments has been mounted, so that the whole number of the check-in desks in the departure terminals on Varna airport became 18. At the same time, during the last year, they were 12.

With the extensions and modernizations made, the environment for serving the passengers has been improved and a possibility for capacity growth with 1800 passengers per hour has been created.

Other improvements:

• the area in front of the  regular airlines check-in desks has been extended with almost 20%, which created a possibility for simultaneous service of the travelers from two regular flights;
• the parking has been enlarged with 60 lots and extension with 100 more is coming. Automated parking system has been built, with modern access control. In construction is an additional outgoing roadway to the highway;
• Rehabilitation of the taxiways Alpha and Eco has been accomplished;
• Foreseen is also the building of inside perimeter fence to separate an public area around Terminal 5 to ease the tour operators activities;
• the luggage carousels in the terminals arriving and departure have been extended and new toilets have been built in terminal 4;
• Ticket-desk in the terminal building of Varna Airport has been opened;
• Business hall for passengers, traveling in the business class of the regular air lines, has been built;
• the information system of the airport has been brought up-to-date.

The whole amount of the investments, for these and other improvements, is about 1.5 millions levs.

From the beginning of the year till now 622192 passengers have crossed the Varna Airport terminals, what is more than 17000 travelers above the same period in the last year, and 6486 airliners have been serviced – 12% more than the year before.

During the period, the flights to Germany have the biggest percentage – 22%, Austria – 12%, England – 11%, Scandinavian countries – 9% etc. The number of the tourists from the Scandinavian countries, England and Austria is also growing. The flights from Russia, which 5-6 years before were a substantial part, began also to restore their positions and for the first six months of the year rose with 34% in relation to the same period of the last year.  

Almost twice more are the flights and the passengers on the regular airlines.

More than 65 Bulgarian and foreign air companies are accomplishing currently their charter programs from Varna Airport to more than 35 states in Europe and Asia. With the regular airlines, flights are being accomplished to Sofia, Budapest, Vienna, London, Amsterdam, Oslo, Madrid and Milan.

Today, before noon, for an hour, the passengers of three flights, from different destinations were serviced. The average time for servicing the travelers of one flight was about 20 minutes.

The first flight serviced on Terminal 5 was the air company “Mineralnie Vadai” from Ufa, with 100 passengers.

For additional information:
Vera Deianova, Press Centre,
Ministry of Transport
Phone: 940 95 34
E-Mail: vdeianova@mt.government.bg