The arrival this morning at Reggio Calabria Airport of an Air Serbia flight from Belgrade, operated with a 144-seater Airbus A319, demonstrates how the Strait airport can effectively act as a complementary and safe terminal for the integrated Strait area when emergencies strike eastern Sicily. The flight, in fact, was directly scheduled at the Reggio airport due to the limitations imposed on Catania Airport by the activity of Etna, confirming that – with adequate planning – Reggio Calabria is fully capable of absorbing and managing a portion of the flows destined for the Catania airport.
The operation offers the opportunity to clarify the alleged complexity of the landing on the Reggio runway (as highlighted today on the airporticalabria.com blog). Despite the particular procedures required, ENAC and ENAV regulations (in particular the AIP notes) provide that commanders in possession of specific qualifications, such as TRE or TRI qualifications (the latter with at least 50 hours of instruction on the type of aircraft), can operate at the airport by completing a simple briefing on the ground, without the need for specific familiarization flights.