As from 1 August, a Malta-registered airline will start connecting Lampedusa with Comiso airport. AeroSud Fly, the airline registered in Malta will initially fly one flight a week, on Thursdays, increasing by the end of August to two flights a week, on Thursdays and on Sundays.

At the same time, the airline will double the flights to Malta: as from 30 July, there will be flights to Malta from Comiso on Tuesdays and Thursdays.

The flights being operated by Medavia, according to reports on the Italian media, will be increased by the beginning of September. The plan is to double the flights to Lampedusa, every Thursday and Sunday while the flights to Malta will increase to three a week, on Tueday, Thursday and Sunday. There will be an extra flight from Malta on Sunday, 25 August, to enable holidaying Italians return from their holiday.

AeroSud Fly also announced that this means the airline will be establishing the very first air route between Malta and Lampedusa, which was never attempted before, with a stop at Comiso on both legs of the flight. The airline plans to attract up to 3,700 passengers to Comiso in September alone.

As for the sea route between Malta and Sicily, the inaugural voyage of the sea link between Augusta and Malta will take place tomorrow Friday. The initial voyage was planned for 1 July but had to be postponed for what were described as ‘administrative and bureaucratic reasons’.

The new sea route was born after an analysis of the traffic patterns between Malta and Sicily which is mainly concentrated around the weekends. It also enables a better use of the mv Audacia, the ship that will make the crossings. The ship is already engaged in the three-weekly Augusta-Salerno-Augusta service inaugurated last November. This route enables it to take on traffic, especially commercial traffic, on its way to Sicily, and now also to Malta, from around Salerno.

Taking the ship at Salerno may be a valid alternative to tourists on their way to Sicily who want to avoid driving all along the Salerno – Reggio Calabria autostrada and the Messina crossing spending just 12 hours on the ship and arriving directly on the eastern coast of Sicily.

The ship will leave Augusta on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays at 9am arriving at Malta after five hours of sea crossing, leaving Malta on Mondays and Wednesdays at 4.30pm and on Saturdays at noon.