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HiSky’s new Chicago O’Hare connection signals stronger Romanian-US travel ties.
European carriers British Airways (BA), HiSky and Air Serbia will each add new North American routes in summer 2026, expanding their transatlantic networks and restoring city pairs that have been unserved for decades.
LONDON HEATHROW-ST. LOUIS
BA will launch nonstop service to St. Louis in April 2026, opening the city’s first direct connection to the UK in more than 20 years and tapping into a European market of more than 350,000 annual passengers.
The service between London Heathrow Airport (LHR) and St. Louis Lambert International Airport (STL) will start on April 19, operating four times per week with Boeing 787-8s. St. Louis will become the carrier’s 27th US destination, adding a second nonstop option from the Missouri city to Europe alongside Lufthansa’s Frankfurt service that began in 2022.
The impact of the BA route could generate between $50 million and $100 million annually for the metro economy through increased business, tourism and convention traffic, according to research cited by STL.
Sabre Market Intelligence data shows that two-way O&D traffic between St. Louis and Europe totaled about 353,000 passengers in 2024. St. Louis-London was the largest city pair, accounting for 44,000 passengers, followed by Rome, Frankfurt, Paris and Dublin. In the absence of nonstop flights to London, Chicago, Charlotte and Atlanta were the largest one-stop markets.
By introducing a nonstop service, BA aims to capture both point-to-point demand and feed connecting flows over London. The airline will also leverage its Atlantic Joint Business partnership with American Airlines to provide wider network access and coordinated schedules.
BA’s new route will provide competition for Lufthansa, which launched Frankfurt–St. Louis flights in June 2022 and currently operates three times per week using Airbus A330-300s. Lufthansa’s entry became the city’s first nonstop connection to mainland Europe in nearly 20 years.
St. Louis briefly had a transatlantic link when defunct Icelandic LCC Wow Air operated a limited Reykjavik Keflavik service from May 2018 to January 2019, but otherwise the market had been without regular European flights since the early 2000s.
The last nonstop to continental Europe before Lufthansa was TWA’s Paris Charles de Gaulle route, which ended in September 2001, while American discontinued its London Gatwick service in October 2003, US Department of Transportation (USDOT) data shows.
BUCHAREST-CHICAGO
Romania’s HiSky plans to commence flights between Bucharest and Chicago, restoring a transatlantic link last served by Tarom more than 20 years ago.
The airline will operate two flights per week between Bucharest Henri Coandă International Airport (OTP) and Chicago O’Hare International Airport (ORD) from June 4, 2026, using A330s, departing Romania’s capital on Thursdays and Sundays. The move comes after launch of flights to New York John F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK) in June 2024. HiSky said the schedule will allow for connections to Cluj, Timișoara, Oradea, Chișinău and Tel Aviv.
The Chicago move comes amid a rebound in Romania-US travel. Sabre data reveals two-way O&D traffic reached 455,000 passengers in 2024, up 8% year over year and 15% above pre-pandemic 2019 levels. Bucharest-New York was the largest city pair with 86,300 passengers, followed by Miami, Los Angeles, Washington and Chicago.
The launch of HiSky’s JFK route 15 months ago restored nonstop Romania-US service for the first time since Delta Air Lines ended its Bucharest-New York JFK flights in August 2009, just over two years after launching the route. In the Bucharest-Chicago market, USDOT data shows that Tarom offered flights between the destinations until 2002, operating a route via Montreal. Tarom ended its last US route—to New York JFK—the following year.
HiSky’s planned new US link comes as Central and Eastern Europe sees growing transatlantic competition. According to OAG Schedules Analyser data, there were 13 nonstop routes operating between the US and the region in summer 2025, including LOT Polish Airlines’ multiple US gateways and Air Serbia’s links to New York and Chicago.
Overall, Central and Eastern Europe-US capacity totaled nearly 1 million two-way seats in summer 2025, up from 864,000 the year prior. That figure is set to rise again in 2026 with American’s planned Philadelphia-Prague and Philadelphia-Budapest launches.
BELGRADE-TORONTO
Air Serbia will enter the Canadian market with the launch of nonstop service between Belgrade and Toronto, marking a return to the country after more than three decades.
The carrier plans to operate flights between Belgrade Nikola Tesla Airport (BEG) and Toronto Pearson International Airport (YYZ) twice a week from May 23, 2026, using A330-200s. Toronto will become the airline’s third North American destination after New York JFK and Chicago O’Hare.
The route will be the sole nonstop connection between Canada and Serbia and the first operated by Air Serbia or its predecessor JAT Yugoslav Airlines since 1992.
The route is expected to meet demand from the large Serbian diaspora in Canada, concentrated around Toronto and southern Ontario. According to Canada’s 2021 census, about 93,000 people in the country identified as being of Serbian origin.
Sabre data highlights that two-way O&D traffic between Canada and Serbia totaled about 92,800 passengers in 2024, all of which traveled indirectly, typically via major European hubs such as London Heathrow, Frankfurt and Munich. The Toronto-Belgrade city pair alone accounted for almost 49,000 passengers—more than half of the total market.
Additionally, Air Serbia’s entry also supports its strategy to position Belgrade as a connecting hub between North America and Southeast Europe. The carrier will offer one-stop connections from Toronto to more than 20 destinations across its regional network, including Athens, Sofia, Bucharest, Ljubljana, Sarajevo, Skopje and Zagreb.
The Toronto service is therefore expected to attract not only point-to-point passengers but also travelers from across the former Yugoslavia who currently connect via Western Europe. According to Canada’s 2021 census, more than 200,000 people of Croatian, Bosnian, and Slovenian descent live in Canada, representing additional potential demand for travel to the region.
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