Last year Wizz Air stationed a fifth A320 at Sofia Airport, from where, this summer it will serve 27 destinations. Ryanair will open a base there this winter, using three 737-800s to launch 19 new routes, It will be competing against Wizz Air on a total of 11 of the routes.

Ryanair’s last four base announcements have been Bucharest (Romania), Vilnius (Lithuania), Sofia (Bulgaria) andPrague (Czech Republic). Back in January, the ULCC also announced it would be making Timisoara in Romania its 78thbase.

Apart from all being located in Central Europe, all five of these airports have something else in common. They are all bases for Wizz Air.

While 11 737-800s are being allocated across these five bases, at three of them only a couple of new routes will be launched to complement the airline’s existing routes.

The exceptions are Sofia, where Ryanair has announced plans to start 19 new routes this winter, and Timisoara, where it will start seven routes.