OREANDA-NEWS. May 11, 2012. The Embraer planes in Estonian Air’s colours will be named after Estonian birds that will be chosen in a public name competition organised by the airline, reported the press-centre of Estonian Air.

The name competition will take place in two parts and in cooperation with the Estonian Ornithological Society.

The jury, which consists of the representatives of the Estonian Ornithological Society and Estonian Air will select the 20 most suitable candidates from which the public can vote their favourite.

Everyone who makes a suggestion in the name competition is entered in a prize draw and the four winners of Estonian Air’s return flights to their chosen destination will be drawn on 3 May.
The CCO of Estonian Air Rauno Parras said that the airline is waiting name suggestions for the first four planes that have arrived and are already in use. “The barn swallow has been the main graphic element used on Estonian Air’s logo and planes for a long time. This bird is extremely attached to its nesting site – they travel almost 10,000 kilometres every year and return to the same nesting site,“ added Parras.

“We plan to name all of our planes after local bird species in the long run – we see this as a chance to introduce Estonian to foreign tourists and we hope that it also inspires Estonians to look up more often,” said Parras.

“Our culture and nature, including birds, are some of the biggest riches of the Estonian nation. Estonia is a very important centre on the migratory routes of birds. The image of Estonians and Finno-Ugric people as water bird people, which was promoted by Lennart Meri, is deeply meaningful: every autumn, water birds in Siberia embark on the same journey as our ancestors, who travelled from the taigas and the tundra to the coast of the Baltic Sea,” said Mati Kose from the Estonian Ornithological Society.

Estonian Air has four Embraer 170 planes at the moment, which are used on the basis of a lease contract. Estonian Air needs 12 Embraer E-Jet planes in total in order to increase the flight frequencies and open new destinations. The planes will be delivered to Estonia from 2013 to 2015.

Estonian Air currently offers business travellers and tourists direct flights to 24 destinations in Europe, Scandinavia and CIS countries. In recent months the airline increased the flight frequencies to Copenhagen, Amsterdam, Brussels, Oslo, Moscow, St Petersburg and Kiev, and opened new destinations such as Helsinki, Riga, Vienna, Hannover, Tbilisi, Trondheim, Joensuu, Jyvaskyla and Kajaani.