Estonia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced that the first two evacuation charters from Dubai and Muscat landed safely in Tallinn in the early hours of 7 March, carrying 320 passengers, mostly families and travellers with medical needs. The flights were operated by Lithuanian wet-lease specialist Heston Airlines and Latvian flag-carrier AirBaltic under an EU Civil Protection Mechanism request.
To qualify, Estonian nationals had to register their short-term stay in the UAE on the MFA’s ‘Reisi Targalt’ (Travel Smart) portal, allowing consular staff to allocate seats by vulnerability. A parallel FlyDubai service touched down in Riga, with ground transport onward to Estonia arranged within two hours.
The MFA said more departures from DXB are pencilled in for 8–9 March but warned that continuing drone threats over the Gulf could force last-minute diversions to Oman. Officials are also cooperating with Finland and Latvia to cross-list citizens on each other’s flights if capacity opens up.
![Tallinn receives first evacuation flights from Dubai as Baltic nations repatriate citizens]()
Whether employees need a last-minute UAE visa extension, a transit permit for Oman, or simply reassurance that their documents are in order, VisaHQ can streamline the process in a matter of hours. The company’s dedicated UAE portal (https://www.visahq.com/united-arab-emirates/) lets mobility managers submit bulk applications, track status in real time, and chat with visa specialists—capabilities that become invaluable when sudden reroutes or evacuations force itinerary changes.
Although regular commercial schedules are slowly resuming, the episode underscores a critical lesson for global mobility managers: even highly connected hubs like Dubai can become bottlenecks overnight, and evacuation charters may be the only fallback for non-resident employees. Companies should therefore maintain updated traveller tracking data and ensure staff are registered in local consular ‘smart traveller’ systems.
Estonia’s operation follows similar pulls by Germany, France and Canada earlier in the week, and is a reminder that bilateral air-services agreements allow charter traffic to operate even when scheduled flights are suspended—a loophole worth remembering for corporate evacuation planning.
To qualify, Estonian nationals had to register their short-term stay in the UAE on the MFA’s ‘Reisi Targalt’ (Travel Smart) portal, allowing consular staff to allocate seats by vulnerability. A parallel FlyDubai service touched down in Riga, with ground transport onward to Estonia arranged within two hours.
The MFA said more departures from DXB are pencilled in for 8–9 March but warned that continuing drone threats over the Gulf could force last-minute diversions to Oman. Officials are also cooperating with Finland and Latvia to cross-list citizens on each other’s flights if capacity opens up.
Whether employees need a last-minute UAE visa extension, a transit permit for Oman, or simply reassurance that their documents are in order, VisaHQ can streamline the process in a matter of hours. The company’s dedicated UAE portal (https://www.visahq.com/united-arab-emirates/) lets mobility managers submit bulk applications, track status in real time, and chat with visa specialists—capabilities that become invaluable when sudden reroutes or evacuations force itinerary changes.
Although regular commercial schedules are slowly resuming, the episode underscores a critical lesson for global mobility managers: even highly connected hubs like Dubai can become bottlenecks overnight, and evacuation charters may be the only fallback for non-resident employees. Companies should therefore maintain updated traveller tracking data and ensure staff are registered in local consular ‘smart traveller’ systems.
Estonia’s operation follows similar pulls by Germany, France and Canada earlier in the week, and is a reminder that bilateral air-services agreements allow charter traffic to operate even when scheduled flights are suspended—a loophole worth remembering for corporate evacuation planning.
