Update on Airlines in India
JET AIRWAYS LAUNCHES SERVICES TO HONGKONG AND SAN FRANCISCO: Effective April 14, 2008 Jet Airways connects Mumbai and Hong Kong. As per the flight schedule, travellers can now arrive at Hongkong early in the morning and return to Mumbai the same evening. The Airline also announced the tentative launch of its daily services from Mumbai to San Francisco via Shanghai, effective May 5, 2008. With the commencement of this new flight, Jet Airways will become the first Indian carrier to operate daily non-stop flights to Shanghai from Mumbai and onward to San Francisco. With the introduction of these two flights, Jet Airways will now fly to 60 destinations.
JET AIRWAYS AND TOKYO'S ANA TO LINK FREQUEST FLIER PROGRAMS ON MUMBAI-TOKYO ROUTE: Jet Airways and Tokyo-based ANA plan to commence a code-sharing and network wide reciprocal frequent flier partnership effective May 21, 2008, subject to regulatory approval. With this agreement, the first of its kind between an Indian and a Japanese carrier, Jet Airways will place its flight code, 9W, on ANA's daily business jet flights between Mumbai and Tokyo Narita. Both airlines will link their Frequent Flier Programmes (FFP), allowing Jet Airways' JetPrivilege members to accrue and redeem miles on ANA-operated flights, and members of ANA's Mileage Club programme to do the same on all flights operated by Jet Airways.
RAJIV GANDHI INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT COMMENCES OPERATIONS: GMR Hyderabad International Airport Limited (GHIAL) promoter of Rajiv Gandhi International Airport, Hyderabad commenced operations from 00:01 hours on Sunday, 23rd March 2008 after it was formally opened by Sonia Gandhi. SpiceJet was the first flight to touchdown on its tarmac. An official welcome was already planned by the airport authorities for a Lufthansa flight from Frankfurt, the foreign airliner was sprayed with water by fire tenders as it moved on the runway – which is a customary welcome. The airport boasts of many firsts – a 4,260-metre runway and a 70-metre air traffic control tower.
BANGALORE INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT TAKES OFF TOO: The Greenfield Bangalore International airport opened her runway to international flights on March 30 after it was inaugurated by the Prime Minister of India. A Singapore bound Air India flight was the first to take off from the new airport.
COCHIN INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT TO BE RECARPETED FROM NOVEMBER: Cochin International Airport is to be closed down to re-carpet the runway during daytime for six months from November this year. CIAL proposes to close down aircraft operations on the runway between November 2008 and May 2009, from 10 a.m. to 8.00 p.m. every day (IST). The re-carpeting work on the runway will start from one end of the runway and will progress to the other end in a continuous and phased manner and will be opened for aircraft movements in the night. It is expected that the entire work can be completed in one working season of six months starting November 2008 to May 2009.
INDIGO AWARDED BEST LOW FARE CARRIER: IndiGo has been awarded ‘Best Low-Fare Carrier in India for the year 2007' by the Air Passengers Association of India (APAI). The poll conducted by APAI among frequent flyers and its members during February received more than 1,600 responses and over 400 online responses. The award is based on scores received on six criteria: value for money, punctuality, connectivity, safety, refunds and baggage handling.
GLOBAL AWARD FOR GOAIR: At the recently-concluded Global Tourism event ITB – Berlin, GoAir, India's smart fare airline, picked up the most coveted award for ‘Best Domestic Airline for Excellence in Quality and Efficient Service'. The airline has been honoured with the prestigious award by PATWA for the second consecutive year in a stiff competition amongst airlines of the Asia Pacific Region.
AEROTROPOLIS – INDIA'S FIRST AIRPORT CITY LIKELY IN DURGAPUR: Bengal Aerotropolis Projects (BAPL) which is developing India's first airport city, or Aerotropolis, in the Asansol-Durgapur region, entered into a technical services arrangement with Singapore-based Changi Airports International (CAI). Under the agreement, CAI would review the master plan of the proposed greenfield airport and also supervise the execution of the project, CAI will conduct training for senior management of BAPL at the Singapore Aviation Academy.
TRIVANDRUM TO BE DEVELOPED AS OPERATIONAL BASE FOR AIR INDIA: The National Aviation Company of India Ltd (NACIL), which runs Air India, plans to develop Trivandrum as an operational base for its domestic flights. Aircraft and crew will be stationed in the city and flights will originate from and terminate in the city. The city has also been an operational base for Air India Express, the company's low-fare carrier, from February 18 this year. Air India has already started construction work on its aircraft maintenance base which is the airlines second such facility in India. The base will service the Boeing 737-800 range of aircraft currently flown by Air India's low-fare carrier Air India Express. The maintenance base will also offer its services to other airlines, including foreign airlines, which operate the Boeing 737-800. The base will be able to accommodate 2 Boeing 737-800 aircraft at a time.
AIR-INDIA'S SUMMER SCHEDULE: In its summer schedule, Air-India will operate new flights from Trivandrum to New Delhi and Bombay via Cochin. These flights will be in addition to those existing on the Trivandrum–Bombay-New Delhi sector. The Trivandrum-Cochin-Bombay flight has been scheduled to enable passengers to connect to Air-India's international flights out of Bombay, including its non-stop Bombay – New York flight.
AIR-INDIA NOW TO FLY NON-STOP FLIGHT TO SHANGHAI FROM DELHI: Air India will now operate a non-stop A310 flight between Delhi and Shanghai. The flight, introduced in 2003, was earlier operated on the Delhi-Bangkok-Shanghai sector. The airline is also introducing a direct service between Bangalore and Dubai three times a week. Similarly, the Bombay-Singapore-Bombay A330 flight, the Delhi-Muscat-Delhi flight and the Bangalore-Male-Bangalore flight will now be daily flights. The frequency of flights on the Delhi-Kabul-Delhi sector has been increased from four to six flights a week.
AIR ARABIA CONNECTS DELHI TO SHARJAH: Air Arabia recently launched services to New Delhi, beginning March 31, 2008. Flights will initially operate four times per week between New Delhi and Air Arabia's hub in Sharjah. Beginning of May, the service will become daily. Currently, Air Arabia provides direct service to 10 destinations in India – Ahmedabad, Bangalore, Chennai, Coimbatore, Jaipur, Kochi, Kozhikode, Mumbai, Nagpur and Thiruvananthapuram. The airline will also increase the frequency of its operations to Kozhikode from three to six times a week by the end of May.
SUN RISES OVER SINGAPORE AIRLINES OPERATIONS TO DELHI: Termed as ‘Sunrise' Services, Singapore Airlines increased its frequency from New Delhi through the addition of two more flights with effect from 30th March 2008, deploying the Boeing 777-200 with a three class configuration on this route. The airline will now operate nine flights in a week from Delhi. In addition to the daily night flights from Delhi, there will be two morning flights on Friday and Sundays from New Delhi to Singapore. The Airlines also plans to start double daily flights from Bangalore, which currently operates ten flights per week. Plans are also on anvil to fly triple flights daily from Mumbai, wherein the airline currently operates 14 flights per week and it intends to ply daily double flights from New Delhi in the near future. Currently, the Airline operates daily flights from Kochi, four flights from Thiruvanthapuram and three flights per week from Coimbatore and is looking at the possibility of introducing flights to Pune and Vishakapatnam.
EMIRATES' ON A DOUBLE DAILY SERVICE TO DELHI: Effective March 30, Emirates has introduced double-daily services to the Capital. The carrier has added one flight every Tuesday, Thursday, Friday and Sunday to its existing daily service to New Delhi. Beginning July another three flights – one every Monday, Wednesday and Saturday – will be added to the route. The extra frequencies will inject over 1,800 seats and more than 100 tonnes of cargo capacity per week per direction. Emirates is also adding two flights per week to Ahmedabad, taking its total frequency on the route to eight flights. Most recently it announced plans to launch six flights per week to Kozhikode, its tenth Indian gateway and third destination in Kerala, from July 1.
April 28, 2008
Posted in: Airlines & Railways