Category Archives: Aviation

The upgraded passenger terminal building of Jammu Airport was inaugurated by Mehbooba Mufti, Chief Minister of Jammu & Kashmir and P. Ashok Gajapathi Raju, Union Minister for Civil Aviation. Jammu Airport belongs to the Indian Air Force, Ministry of Defence and AAI maintains a Civil Enclave for civil aircraft operations. During the year 2016-17, passenger traffic movement at Jammu Airport reached 1.16 million and the passenger growth rate has touched 29 per cent in the first quarter of 2017-18. To cope with the increasing passenger growth and demand, expansion and upgradation of existing Terminal Building of Jammu Airport has been completed. The area of the terminal building is expanded from 6700 sq. mtrs. to 14,500 sq. mtrs. with an upgraded peak hour handling capacity of 720 passengers at a time, an increase from the existing 360 peak hour passengers. Also present at the occasion was Jayant Sinha, Union Minister of State for Civil Aviation; Dr. Jitendra Singh, Union Minister of State for Development of North Eastern Region, PMO, Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions, Atomic Energy and Space; Dr. Nirmal Kumar Singh, Deputy Chief Minister of Jammu & Kashmir; Kavinder Gupta, Speaker of J&K Legislative Assembly; Shri Jugal Kishore Sharma, Member of Parliament (Lok Sabha) and Shri Shamsher Singh Manhas, Member of Parliament (Rajya Sabha) along with Dr. Guruprasad Mohapatra, Chairman, Airports Authority of India. The upgraded passenger Terminal Building of Jammu Airport is a glass and steel structure and is equipped with Passenger facilities and amenities like CUTE-complied Check-in Counters, Common Use Self-Service (CUSS) kiosk for check-in, central air-conditioning, two arrival conveyer belts, escalators and glass elevators, flight information display system, pa system with comfortable seating capacity.

Air India has launched its first non-stop flight, the Dreamliner B-787, to Stockholm, Sweden, from Delhi. The inaugural flight had an all-female crew on board. The Dreamliner will fly thrice a week, every Wednesday, Friday and Sunday and leave Delhi at 14.50 hours and reach Stockholm at 18.40. The return flight will leave Stockholm at 20:40 hours and reach Delhi at 07:20 hours next day. According to an official statement, with an increase of passenger volume between India and Sweden by 50 per cent in three years, the direct flight is likely to further bolster the growing relationship between India and Sweden. The launch event on August 16, included lighting of lamp, cake and ribbon cutting ceremonies, was held at the Indira Gandhi International Airport, Delhi in the presence of Air India Chairman Ashwani Lohani and Chargé d’Affaires of Embassy of Sweden Gautam Bhattacharyya. The flying time of passengers will be reduced by at least 2 hours. Ashwani Lohani, Chairman, Air India said, “We are confident that Air India’s first foray to Scandinavia would add new dimensions to trade, commerce and tourism between the two countries – India & Sweden.”

Vinay Dube  joins Jet Airways as its Chief Executive Officer after receipt of all requisite Government and regulatory approvals. Dube’s appointment was approved by the Jet Airways Board of Directors at their last meeting held on May 30, 2017. An accomplished industry leader and an aviation professional with close to three decades of global business experience, Dube has an established track record of leadership and business expansion at large, complex, multi-national organisations including varied roles at Delta Airlines Inc., Sabre, Inc., and American Airlines in the USA, Europe and Asia. In his last role as SVP-Asia Pacific for Delta Airlines Inc., he headed the region as Business Head with P&L responsibility and was also a Board Observer at China Eastern. During his tenure in Asia, Dube successfully led the turnaround of the Airline in the Asia Pacific markets, restructured the network, established strategic partnerships, worked extensively on brand-building and successfully brought about a transformation in the work culture of his teams. He has also held various Board-level positions throughout his career. Commenting on that appointment and subsequent approval by the Government as the airline’s CEO, Naresh Goyal, Chairman, Jet Airways, said, “Vinay will lead the Executive Management Committee to deliver on our strategic objectives, at a time when the Indian Aviation market is poised to develop manifold going forward. In our recent past, we have made demonstrable progress towards achieving long-term goals. I am confident that under Vinay’s leadership, we will accelerate the momentum of turning around the company to higher growth and profits resulting in all-round benefits to our employees as well as to our shareholders, as well as deepen our relationship with our strategic partner Etihad Airways.”

GMR Hyderabad International Airport Ltd (GHIAL), which operates Rajiv Gandhi International Airport (RGIA), Hyderabad has announced that under the umbrella of GHIAL’s signature programme ‘Passenger is Prime’, and in collaboration with CISF, it has become the first airport in India to provide pre-embarkation security check right at the terminal’s entry gate. This will serve as ‘Express Security Check’ facility for domestic passengers travelling without any check-in baggage. Hyderabad Airport has earmarked a dedicated space at terminal entry point of departure level for the new ‘Express Security Check’ facility. The domestic passengers, after printing their boarding pass from the newly installed ‘self-service kiosks’ located conveniently at the departures forecourt area outside the terminal building, can now enter the Express Security Check lane without getting into the check-in area and head straight towards the boarding area. Currently, Hyderabad Airport handles more than 18,000 domestic departure passengers on daily basis, of which close to 40 per cent travel without any checked-in baggage, and carry at most only hand baggage. Recently the security check area at Hyderabad Airport was enhanced to offer over 40% more security lanes for domestic passengers. Additionally, a dedicated lane has also been earmarked for passengers with reduced mobility and airline crew members, helping them clear security check with minimum of hassles and waiting.

Air India’s low-cost arm Air India Express will launch direct flights between Delhi and Madurai with effect from September 15. The introductory one-way fare offered on Delhi-Madurai sector starts from Rs 3,975 and the return journey fare starts from Rs 7,950, the airline said in a statement. The service will be offered four days in a week i.e. on Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays. The airline will also be offering passengers the additional facility to buy special meals of their choice online on select sectors, the statement added. The budget carrier currently operates around 545 flights per week, connecting 15 Indian cities to 14 destinations in the Middle East and South East Asia. The airline has a fleet of 23 Boeing 737-800 NG aircraft.

Demand for domestic travel climbed 8.2% in June compared to June 2016, up slightly from the 7.9% growth seen in May. India led all markets with a 20.3% rise in domestic traffic in June. However, the very strong upward trend in traffic has slowed since the country’s unexpected ‘demonetisation’ in November 2016. India’s streak of year-on-year double-digit traffic growth may have ended with June. June capacity increased 7.0%, and load factor rose 0.9 percentage points to 84.3%. In a nutshell, air travel recorded its fastest first-half growth in 12 years, pushing load factors to record highs. And the peak northern summer travel season is likely to be record-breaking. The International Air Transport Association (IATA) announced global passenger traffic data for June showing that demand (measured in total revenue passenger kilometers or RPKs) rose by 7.8% compared to the year-ago period. “This is all good news. The demand for travel is strong and that, in turn, will make a positive contribution to the global economy. This growth will also further expose infrastructure deficiencies. In every part of the world airport and air navigation infrastructure is struggling to cope with demand. There are plenty of examples linking connectivity and economic prosperity. But few governments have been able to deliver on the imperatives of sufficient capacity, quality aligned with user needs and affordability. This year’s strong growth is a reminder that there is no time to lose,” said Alexandre de Juniac, IATA’s Director General and CEO. June capacity (available seat kilometers or ASKs) increased by 6.5%, and load factor rose 1.0 percentage point to 81.9%. For the first six months of 2017, the industry experienced a 12-year high in traffic growth (7.9%) and a …

Vietnam’s low-cost airline, VietjetAir has appointed Bird Travels as its GSA in India. Vietjet has been expanding its flight network in Vietnam and will continue to spread its wings to new destinations in the Asia Pacific region and around the world. Vietjet’s flight network covers Vietnam extensively and includes connections to Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Hong Kong, Korea, Taiwan, Myanmar and eight destinations in China. It is operating a fleet of A320s and A321s having an average age of 3.3 years.

AirAsia has introduced two new routes between India and Thailand with a Bangkok-Jaipur connection and a Bangkok-Tiruchirappalli connection respectively. While both routes will ply four times a week, the former will run on Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday and Sunday while the latter will run every Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday starting September 28, 2017.  Aiming to attract Indian shoppers to Thailand, the new routes come with promotional fares available. Tassapon Bijleveld, CEO of Thai AirAsia said that AirAsia plans to continually penetrate the Indian market in the latter half of 2017 as it is a major market with great growth potential.  Indian travellers rank sixth among the most frequent visitors to Thailand while the Kingdom responds to all kinds of lifestyles from shoppers and night-time entertainment seekers to travellers looking for hospitality and wellness retreat.  The airline is confident that the two new routes will stimulate tourism for both countries. Thai AirAsia presently flies direct from Thailand to four fascinating Indian cities of Chennai, Bangalore, Kolkata and Kochi, maintaining a Load Factor average of 80 percent with 80-85 percent of passengers coming from India, indicating determined strength of the market where travellers have consistently showed excellent feedback toward AirAsia.

The Ministry of Commerce and Industry, Government of India, and the International Chamber for Service Industry (ICSI) will jointly organise an International Conference on Strengthening Aviation Network between North East Indian Region and Bangladesh, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar and Vietnam (BCLMV countries) at Radisson Blu Hotel Guwahati in Assam today. The mega event aims to bring nations closer by augmenting and improving travel, trade and people to people contacts through a stronger aviation network. It will be attended by dignitaries from the Ministry of Civil Aviation, Airports Authority of India, as well as Indian and international carriers and other leading aviation business entities. Over the past few years India’s trade with the BCLMV countries has grown exponentially with the total trade with CLMV countries growing seven-fold from $1.4 billion in 2005 to $10.3 billion in 2015 and current trade volume with Bangladesh at about $6.6 billion. The key points of deliberation at the conference were the need of direct connectivity of airlines between NER and BCLMV countries, infrastructure development and capacity building along with the liberalisation of ASEAN open sky policy for NER (I). The initiative shows that the NER figures very high in the list of priorities of not only the government but also of the air transport sector which sees immense unrealised potential in this part of the country.

Jet Airways has appointed Discover the World to provide sales and marketing in Switzerland. Jenny Adams, CEO, Discover the World, says, ““Discover is delighted to partner with Jet Airways for the first time. Our team in Switzerland, headed by Director Richard Gugerli, will expand the airline’s visibility, helping to increase its revenues especially through its code share partnership with Air France/KLM.” From 2017 end, Jet Airways will fly to India 54 times a week from London Heathrow, Paris CDG, and Amsterdam to Mumbai, Delhi, Bengaluru, and Chennai. This includes new services from Amsterdam to Bengaluru and Paris CDG to Chennai which will commence on October 29, 2017. Jet Airways also flies daily from Amsterdam to Toronto.