More domestic flights from BIAL

More domestic flights from BIAL
Friday April 18 2008 10:10 IST

Monica Jha
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The HAL airport at Bangalore.

BANGALORE: Airlines are set to increase their domestic flights from Bangalore. But the directive from the Karnataka High Court keeping the HAL Airport operational after BIA commences operations, leaves one question open --will that happen?

Increase in flight schedules is dependent on the already-concluded talks between the airlines and Bangalore International Airport Limited and not with the present HAL airport.

Meanwhile, the directive has not dampened the spirits of BIAL. It has enough reasons to be on cloud nine, though clouds of uncertainty still surround the date of the launch of BIA.

Many domestic airlines will increase the number of flights from BIA for the summer. Domestic airlines had requested an average of 20 to 25 per cent increase in slots and many have it granted.

Kingfisher Airlines, Air Deccan and Jet Airways will constitute 62 per cent of domestic operation this season, BIAL CEO Albert Brunner, told this website’s newspaper.

This increase comes after the speculations that many airlines, especially the Low Cost Carriers (LCC), would fly away from BIAL or cut down on short-haul flights due to high user development fee (UDF) on domestic passengers and long travel time to reach the new airport.

The hike in the price of aviation turbine fuel, which is passed on to the passengers as fuel surcharge, forced the talk of reduction in the number of flights.

Interestingly, the major destinations of domestic flights from BIA for this summer are Mumbai, Delhi, Chennai and Hyderabad.

Founder and MD of the LCC major Simplifly Deccan (formerly Air Deccan), Captain G R Gopinath, confirmed that Deccan would increase the number of flights once BIA starts operations.

Airlines typically go by two seasons: summer (March end to October end) and winter (October end to March end).

However, the summer for BIA would start late this year, owing to the delay in its commissioning which was scheduled with the start of summer.

There will also be a huge change in the domestic flight schedule after the new airport becomes operational, as 29 per cent of flights have been given better timings as requested, said a BIAL official.

With this, the total number of domestic flights from BIA per week will become 1,355, which is 85 per cent of the total 1,595 flights in a week, Brunner said.

New slots for intl airlines

All international airlines that had requested for slots this season have been given slots at the new airport.

These airlines are Kingfisher Airlines, Dragon Air (subsidiary of Cathay Pacific), Air Mauritius, Tiger Airways, Oman Air and cargo carriers Quikjet and Jett8.

Many existing international airlines that had requested for increased frequency have been granted the same.

Thai Airways, Emirates, Singapore Airlines, Air India and Indian Airlines among others, had earlier requested for increased frequency.

“The additional capacity at the new airport enabled BIAL to fulfil the airlines' requirements to increase the number of flights,” explained Brunner.