International Air Traffic
Airlines
As of March 31, 2024, Finnair airline will start operating the Tartu–Helsinki air connection.
There are 12 trips a week between Tartu and Helsinki Airports. Flights to Helsinki depart from Tartu at 06:00 am and at 15:00. Flights to Tartu depart from Helsinki at 13:50 and 23:55. The approximate duration of a one-way flight is 45 minutes. The flights to Helsinki ensure convenient connecting flights to nearly a hundred destinations worldwide.
See the exact flight schedule and purchase tickets from the Finnair website.
On 23 December 2023, the City of Tartu and Finnair Oyj signed a public service agreement under which Finnair will operate scheduled flights between the Tartu and Helsinki Airport from 31 March 2024 until 31 December 2027. For this, the City of Tartu will pay the airline a total of €3.2 million in compensation.
Tartu Airport is located 10 kilometers (about 6.21 mi) from the center of Tartu. Tartu city centre and the airport are conveniently connected by bus and taxi connections, and there is an unattended parking lot free of charge at the airport. More information about getting to the airport can be found on the Tartu Airport website.
History
Tartu Airport has stood where it now stands since 1946, when a unit for medical aid aircraft was set up there. Later it was known as a base for ambulance flights for Maarjamõisa Hospital. Most flights from the airport were nevertheless organised to meet agricultural and forestry needs. When the number of passenger flights increased, a new runaway and facilities were built.
Regular flights to Piirissaare, Jõhvi, Narva, Viljandi, Pärnu, Kihnu, Ruhnu, Valga, Võru, Kuressaare, Kärdla, Leningrad (St Petersburg), Moscow, Minsk, Kyiv, Odessa, Simferopol and Helsinki started from here.
Since 1990 Tartu Airport has been a training base for aviation education. At present the Estonian Aviation Academy is the biggest employer at the airport, with the proportion of training flights per year reaching as high as 98%.
Regular air traffic in Tartu was restored in 2009.
