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What Do a President, His Holiness and James Bond Have in Common?

28/11/2013 by Aviation Times

CEOs of international airports are extremely occupied to handle all interests of the aviation community and infrastructure that may be called the gateway to a city or region. Their schedule is loaded with appointments and obligations.
CEPA-EXPO is extremely pleased that Jiri Pos, CEO and Chairman of the Board of Prague Airport, Ivan Thrlik, CEO and Chairman of the Board of the Bratislava Airport and Radek Zabransky, Sales and marketing Director of Karlovy Vary Airport made time available to attend the conference and will contribute to the quality of the discussions in this morning’s ‘Airport Session – Importance of airports in relationship to industry development.’

For your visit to the conference you may have arrived at the Vaclav Havel Prague Airport and depart from there tomorrow. Here are some things you may want to know. The Airport clears about 30,000 passengers and 359 take-offs and landings per day and the yearly figure stands at roughly 12 million passengers. Scheduled commercial flights account for 88 percent of the operation at the airport. Fifty carriers operate at the Prague airport, flying to 132 destinations on scheduledm flights. The top five airports to which passengers from Prague fly most frequently are Paris (CDG), Moscow (SVO), Frankfurt, London (LHR) and Amsterdam. As for countries passengers fly most often to Great Britain, Germany, France, Russia and Italy. It is the busiest airport in the ‘newer’ EU member states. With a share of 30%, the major air carrier at the airport is CSA, the flagship carrier of the Czech Republic and one of the five oldest airlines in the world. The airport has more than 2000 employees, while approximately 15,000 people are employed by companies operating at the airport or linked to its operation.

In October 2012, the airport was officially renamed the ‘Václav Havel Airport Prague’ after the country’s first post-Velvet Revolution president, Václav Havel, who served as president of Czechoslovakia (1989- 1992) and then as President of the Czech Republic (1993-2003). This name change of the airport took place on 5 October, what would have been Havel’s 76th birthday. The IATA code PRG code and ICAO code LKPR remained the same. Before taking office as President, Václav Havel was a playwright,  essayist and poet. He wrote more than 20 plays and numerous nonfiction works, translated internationally. Vaclav Havel was befriended with the Dalai Lama. Most recently His Holiness visited the former Czech, President, at that time, in Prague on December 10, 2011. For his flights to Central Europe, the Dalai Lame frequently used The Embraer Legacy 600 of Grossmann Jet Services of which CEPA’s initiator Dagmar Grossmann is CEO and Founder, and who on one of the occasions stated: “It’s not a matter of luck that we are escorting His Holiness again. The Dalai Lama is of course one of the most distinguished clients but we like to provide the same level of service to all our passengers.”

In 2006, the airport of the Czech capital city of Prague was used as the location for a scene in the James Bond film ‘Casino Royale’. But the airport along with a Virgin Atlantic Airbus A340-600, depicts a scene that takes place at Miami  International Airport in the film. The film plot said: “In Miami, 007 kills Dimitrios and follows Le Chiffre’s henchman, Carlos, to Miami International Airport. There, Bond foils Le Chiffre’s plan to destroy the prototype ‘Skyfleet’ airliner by stopping the fuel truck he was planning to crash into the airplane.” Most of film was shot at Barrandov Studios in Prague and the final shoots were done at the Pinewood Studio near London. The well known Czech spa, Karlovy
Vary, was used as the exterior of the Casino Royale, with the Grand Hotel Pupp serving as “Hotel Splendide”.

Prague’s Airport CEO, Jiri Pos, may not be able not give you any information on the Dalai Lama visits or the film shoots with MI6 agent James Bond, but he may comment on the long-term and stable increase in the number of pointto-point passengers and the favorable impact it has on his airport’s revenues, as well influences an increase in the area of non-aviation commercial business. Or, he may comment on the collaboration with Incheon International Airport of Seoul, South Korea by developing new connections between Prague and Seoul, and on exchanging information and experience as well as engaging in joint marketing activities.