Trade Air

Is Trade Air safe?

Yes, on its recent record. Trade Air has not had an accident in the last 20 years, flies under the same EU safety rules as Croatia Airlines, and holds IATA's IOSAIOSAThe IATA Operational Safety Audit, an international audit of an airline's safety management and operations. Every IATA member must pass it.More in the glossary safety audit. The catch is age. Its five Airbus A320s were built between about 2001 and 2009, which makes this one of the oldest A320 fleets flying passengers in Europe. We score it 81.

Few passengers choose Trade Air by name. The Zagreb company, founded in 1994, mostly flies charters for tour operators and rents its jets with crews to other airlines. In 2024 it operated 6,645 flights and carried about 530,000 passengers, according to figures on its home page.

Who flies with Trade Air?

Three kinds of traveller end up on a Trade Air jet. Holidaymakers on package trips from Croatia and Slovenia fly its charters; it opened a Ljubljana base after Adria Airways collapsed in 2019, and in 2021 it based an A319 in Pristina. Passengers of other airlines meet it through wet leases: Air Montenegro flew a Trade Air A320, operated by Trade Air, for the whole 2024 summer, Air France used one of its Fokker 100s in 2018, and in 2026 the Israeli airline Israir has used Trade Air jets, including on Tel Aviv to Ljubljana flights from late May after Slovenia held up Israir's own permit. And people on Croatia's subsidised domestic routes, such as Osijek to Zagreb or Split to Dubrovnik, book it directly.

Those domestic flights stopped at the end of March 2026, when the subsidy contracts expired before the government had run a new tender, and restarted on 20 July. They are flown by a 33-seat Saab 340 turboprop rather than by the A320s. The Saab is not on the Croatian register, so it is leased in; if another company's crew flies it, that company's record applies, not Trade Air's.

What is the accident history?

The Aviation Safety Network lists one fatal Trade Air accident. On 30 October 2005 a Let L-410 turboprop, carrying parcels from Bergamo to Zagreb, took off at night in fog with less than 400 metres of visibility. Within about a minute it had turned back on itself and hit a field about a kilometre from the runway. Both pilots and the captain's wife, who was on board, were killed. Italy's investigators could not pin down a single cause. They pointed to the crew losing track of the aircraft's attitude, possibly because the load shifted or because taxiway lights in the fog disoriented the pilot, and to an inexperienced co-pilot and weak teamwork.

That crash happened almost 21 years ago, so it sits outside the 20-year window we use and does not lower the accident score. It does explain why we do not put Trade Air in the top band: a small airline with a clean recent record has fewer flights behind it to prove the point.

Since then the record is quiet. AeroInside lists two events in the last decade, an engine problem that diverted a Fokker 100 flying for Air France to Paris in June 2018, and a bird strike that brought an A320 back to Ljubljana in May 2021. Both landed normally.

How old is the fleet?

The Croatian register lists five A320s for Trade Air in October 2026: 9A-BTH, BTI, BTK, BTL and BTM. Their serial numbers run from 1454 to 3921, which dates them from about 2001 to 2009. Trade Air sold its first A320, a 2016 purchase, in September 2024 after 5,456 flights, and has added two more used jets since, the latest in August 2025.

The A320 is a fly-by-wireFly-by-wireA flight control system in which the pilot's inputs go to computers, which then move the control surfaces. Many such systems also stop unsafe manoeuvres.More in the glossary design with a long safety record (see our A320 family page), and age alone does not make a jet unsafe. But older airframes need more structural inspections and spend more time in the hangar, and when one breaks down mid-season a charter airline with five jets has little slack. Expect delays and aircraft swaps more than any safety problem.

Who checks Trade Air?

Croatia's Civil Aviation Agency issues its certificate under EASA rules, and Croatia is in the FAA's Category 1FAA IASAThe US FAA's check of whether a country's aviation regulator meets ICAO standards. Category 1 means it does; Category 2 means it does not.More in the glossary. Trade Air says it has held an IOSA registrationIOSAThe IATA Operational Safety Audit, an international audit of an airline's safety management and operations. Every IATA member must pass it.More in the glossary since May 2008 and kept renewing it. It is not an IATA member, but IATA's IOSA registry confirms the claim: it lists Trade Air as registered after a 2026 audit, valid until 5 October 2028. We score oversight 90, the level we give EU airlines with IOSA, such as Croatia Airlines.

Before you fly Trade Air

• Check the "operated by" line. On a wet-leased flight Trade Air's crew and maintenance fly you; on its domestic routes in 2026 it may be another operator's Saab.
• Allow for delays on charters. A small fleet of old jets means a technical fault can hold a flight for hours while a spare aircraft is found.
• Keep the tour operator's contact handy. On package trips your rights to rebooking and compensation run through the company that sold the trip, not through Trade Air.

How we scored it

The accident record (88) is clean for 20 years but built on low volume, with the 2005 crash just outside the window. Oversight (90) is EU-level with IOSAIOSAThe IATA Operational Safety Audit, an international audit of an airline's safety management and operations. Every IATA member must pass it.More in the glossary. The fleet (55) costs the most, because all five A320s are over 17 years old. Incidents (82) and a charter network that in 2026 included Israir flights to Tel Aviv (72) sit in between.