Turkish airline AtlasGlobal has weathered several storms over the preceding months. Once again, it appears the airline has ceased operations. Will it be for good this time?
I say “maybe” and “appears” because there has been no formal announcement from the airline. The website is still operational and you can still search for flights, though all inventory appears to have been zeroed out. In fact, at press time a large banner on the homepage still read, “We are up in the air again!”
Turkish media is reporting that the airline has declared bankruptcy and will cease operations for good. Staff were allegedly told to stay home from work starting yesterday. But you would think we’d hear something from the airline itself.
Media reports claim AtlasGlobal blamed the move from Istanbul Ataturk to Istanbul’s new airport for much of its problems, with higher costs and restricted cargo transport at the new airport hampering revenue.
The writing may have been on the wall. AtlasGlobal suspended flights for a month, starting in late November 2019. Only days before Christmas did it resume flying again. But less than a month later it suspended flights once again.
CONCLUSION
AtlasGlobal offered excellent fares, which will be missed because it placed downward pricing pressure on other carriers. It also offered interesting promos, like unlimited business class flights for a flat fee.
> Read More: Airline Offers Unlimited Business Class Flights for a Flat Fee
Perhaps we will never know if the new Istanbul Airport was really the problem or it just faced the same competitive pressures that doomed so many other European carriers. In any case, we still do not have an official announcement from AtlasGlobal.
One more thing. Before we get into the debate over whether Turkey is European or Asian, can we just agree that the country straddles both continents? Thanks.
Will you miss AtlasGlobal?
They’re an Air France partner so i had a chance to fly their business class from IST to CDG (en route to JFK). Had a true business class product with nice seats, food and service. Definitely beat the euro blocked-middle-seat version in every parameter AND I got full Delta mileage credit. Sad if they will cease operations.
“can we just agree that the country straddles both continents?”
So it’s an Eurasian airline?
I would call it that. TK too.
Still waiting refund from december … Will i ever aee it …
Matthew, it is very good article. This is very sad but quite predictable. I think the airline could not find own “niche”. The full service airline – Turkish as a competitor wins. Low cost airline – not really, Pegasus wins. AtlasGlobal lost bogh markets – national and regional. It is very difficult to survive with so much competition.
They don’t give refunds at all for all these flights they cancelled. I will never see my money and never got so much as an email to let me know they cancelled my flights. I paid three times my ticket costs to get home. They flat out robbed their customers and its been happening for years. They are corrupt and need to be over and done with!!
Hahah. Hahahah. Hahahah. Turkey, European? Nope. No one is agreeing to anything.
For what it’s worth, there are 2 European airlines that shut down this year so far, and both were Italian airlines. Air Italy got much more news, but Ernest Airlines, a small LCC, quietly shut down in January.
Ernest Hemingway would not be proud.
It was a full-service carrier with low-cost elements and offering decent service at competitive prices. Moreover, popular or not, it was a competitor for Turkish with ties to AF-KL and Skyteam. It could be a completely different story 😉
Can we please stop pretending Turkey is in Europe? That small sliver of land doesn’t make Turkey European. It’s a lot of great things, but European isn’t one of them.
My friends and I will miss the direct flights between Istanbul and Yerevan. It is much more complicated to fly this route without AtlasGlobal!
We will really miss Atlas Global, we used them regularly flying and touching down in Turkey before carring on to North Cyprus. We found them to be a reasonable priced airline serving complimentary food & drinks, and flights mainly on time, with friendly staff, we travelled from West Yorkshire down to Luton and Stansted frequently to use Atlas Global and may i say if the airline does cease to operate it will be sadly missed.