Emirates may allow mobile calls in India

New Delhi: Emirates' flyers to, from and over India may soon be allowed to make calls using their mobile phones, apart from offering onboard internet. The Dubai-based mega airline has told TOI it will seek regulatory approvals to allow "customers to connect using Wi-Fi and mobile phones over India very soon."
Emirates' head of customer experience Patrick Brannelly told TOI: "TRAI recommendation to allow in-flight Wi-Fi and mobile services on flights within Indian airspace is good news for our customers. We are confident that our satellite data providers will engage with the Indian authorities to establish regulatory clarity for licensing and operations, to meet necessary requirements, thereby allowing our customers to connect using Wi-Fi and mobile phones over India very soon."
About voice calls, the Emirates website says: "Make calls on your mobile just as you would when you're on the ground.

Airport authority builds new terminal at Guwahati

Guwahati: Airports Authority of India (AAI) has started working on the new integrated terminal building of the Lokpriya Gopinath Bordoloi International Airport at Guwahati.
Its foundation stone was laid on 28 Jan by Civil aviation minister P Ashok Gajapathi Raju and CM Sarbananda Sonowal.
This step has been taken to facilitate the growth of air infrastructure in North east.

Honeywell welcomes TRAI's decision to permit Wi-Fi in-flights

Hyderabad: Honeywell Aerospace has welcomed the "TRAI's decision to permit
in-flight Wi-Fi on domestic and international flights.

In a statement on Wednesday, Honeywell said it was a groundbreaking step for the aviation market.

According to the International Air Transport Association, India will become the world's third largest commercial aviation market by 2025, with an estimated increase to 278 million annual passengers.

This level of growth will require the Indian aviation market to be proactive in meeting the needs of its growing number of passengers, airlines and flight crews.
To Read the News in Full 31/01/18 UNI

Former Go Air CEO Wolfgang to join IndiGo as Chief Operating Officer

Mumbai: Former Go Air CEO Wolfgang Prock Schauer will join IndiGo as Chief Operating Officer. Prock Schauer had quit Go Air in 2017.
Prock-Schauer will take charge of IndiGo's operational aspects including flight operations, maintenance, engineering and in-flight services. He will also be responsible for the airline's airport services. Prock-Schauer in his new role will report to IndiGo president Aditya Ghosh.
The appointment of Prock Schauer also signals the strengthening of the management team at IndiGo as it begins its next chapter of growth of regional and long-haul operations.
Prior to joining GoAir, Prock-Schauer, an Austrian held the position of CEO and executive director of Air Berlin, a German airline carrying over 32 million passengers annually, with 140 aircraft operations. He also served as CEO of Jet Airways from 2003 to 2009 after which he left to join Lufthansa-owned British Midland in UK.

SpiceJet announces 20 new non-stop flights

Chennai: SpiceJet has announced 20 new non-stop flights on domestic routes -- including Chennai-Mangalore and Guwahati-Chennai routes -- and will add frequency on many routes starting February 11.
The airline is all set to introduce daily direct flights on the Bengaluru-Rajahmundry, Chennai-Mangalore and Guwahati-Chennai routes and a direct flight between Bengaluru-Tirupati which would operate on all days except Tuesdays.
SpiceJet will become the only carrier to operate between Kolkata and Jabalpur and Bengaluru and Puducherry with daily direct flights.

India’s Congested Airports Slowing Down Air Traffic Growth

Congested airports at India’s top cities will hamper air traffic growth in the world’s third-largest aviation market even as carriers add more aircraft to their fleet and fly to smaller cities.

India’s domestic air traffic is expected to grow 18-20 and touch 150 million in the year ending March 2019, according to Centre for Asia Pacific Aviation. CAPA reduced the forecast by at least 2 percentage points considering capacity constraints at large airports like Mumbai and Chennai.

The aviation think tank expects domestic traffic to reach 125 million in the year ending March. Airport operators are under-prepared for growth, CAPA India Chief Executive Officer Kapil Kaul said today in Mumbai.

That means most large airports are operating close to full capacity as at least 124 new aircraft would be inducted by March 2019—an increase of 25 percent.

Airlines slash fares to boost summer travel

Chennai: The low fares introduced by airlines to boost travel during lean season after the Republic Day long weekend have come as an advantage for travellers who are planning short getaways during the Good Friday long weekend and summer holidays.
Air fares, which were high for travel during weekends and on days close to the begining of summer holidays in the last week of March and first week of April, have come down because of the discounts currently on offer by airlines.
The four-day sale by SpiceJet starting at 769 was open till midnight on 25 January for a travel period lasting upto December and for destinations like Jammu-Srinagar, Silchar-Guwahati, Dehradun-Delhi, Delhi - Jaipur, Agartala-Guwahati, Coimbatore-Bengaluru, Kochi-Bengaluru and Delhi-Dehradun. Meanwhile, GoAir had fares starting as low as 726 to 3,926 inclusive of taxes for travel till December.

Kannur International Airport set to take flight; commercial operations may be launched in June

Taking the cake as far as aviation infrastructure in India is concerned, the small state of Kerala would get its fourth international airport once the Kannur International Airport (KIAL) gets operational later this year. Significantly, with a proposed runway of 4000 m, KIAL would be bigger than the Mangaluru airport in Karnataka and the Kozhikode airport in Kerala between which it lies sandwiched. Flight trial operations are going to commence in a few weeks and commercial operations could be launched as early as June, if things go as per plan, KIAL Managing Director P Bala Kiran tells FE. All works at the airport, which has come up on a sprawling 2,092 acres at Mattanur, are expected to be complete by February, 2018, he adds. Kerala’s second greenfield airport to come up in public-private partnership (PPP) mode after the Cochin International Airport, KIAL has multiple stakeholders: the Kerala government (35%), public sector undertakings (25%), Airports Authority of India (10%), and cooperatives, banks and individual shareholders (30%). The development of the airport has been planned in phases on a modular basis, to suit future requirements and minimise initial investment. Phase I was originally estimated to cost Rs 1,892 crore, of which Rs 1,000 crore was the equity capital and Rs 892 crore the debt component. To fund runway extension, the company’s authorised capital was recently increased from Rs 1,000 crore to Rs 1,500 crore.

Indigo to start low-cost flights to Europe from next winter

InterGlobe Aviation's Indigo Airlines is planning to start low-cost flights to major European cities including London, Paris, Hong Kong, and Madrid from New Delhi next winter, reported Business Standard.

The airline has sought regulatory approval to operate flights to London, Paris, Madrid, and Hong Kong from New Delhi with Airbus A330 aircraft.

“The low-cost structure of IndiGo makes it ideal to offer a long-haul service. An airline’s cost is primarily towards fuel burn, aircraft acquisition, and labour — all of which are among the lowest for IndiGo,” a senior IndiGo executive told the paper, adding these air tickets will be priced at least 30 percent lower than the prevalent rate.

To offer low-cost operations, the airlines may go in for dense economy seating with a few premium seats (with more leg space) along with unbundled products like meal, priority boarding, and seat selection for economy passengers.

India World's Third Largest Growing Domestic Aviation Market, Says Economic Survey

New Delhi: With the civil aviation sector witnessing "considerable progress", India has become the world's third largest domestic aviation market in terms of the number of tickets sold, according to the Economic Survey. To connect unserved and under-served airports, the government has come out with regional connectivity scheme UDAN (Ude Desh ka Aam Naagrik) and flights on many routes have commenced under this initiative.

"India is the 3rd largest and the fastest growing domestic aviation market in the world in terms of number of domestic tickets sold. In 2016-17, annual growth in domestic passenger departures was 23.5 per cent as compared to 3.3 per cent in the US and 10.7 per cent in China," said the Survey tabled in Parliament today.

During the 2007-08 to 2016-17 period, domestic passenger traffic registered a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 9.89 per cent.

RCS-Udan to spur civil aviation sector's growth: Economic Survey

New Delhi: The Economic Survey 2017-18 tabled in Parliament on Monday cited the regional connectivity scheme -- Ude Desh ka Aam Naagrik -- (RCS-UDAN) as one of the important initiatives taken to spur the growth of the civil aviation sector.

"This is a first-of-its-kind scheme globally to stimulate regional connectivity through a market based mechanism," the survey said.

"... 27 states, UTs have already signed MoUs with the central government under RCS-UDAN. Many private sector airlines are actively participating under this scheme."

According to the survey presented by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley in Parliament, other initiatives like revival of 50 unserved and underserved airports, setting-up of 18 greenfield airports and liberalisation of air services will lift the growth rate of the sector.

Night flights at LGBI from March

Guwahati: The Lokpriya Gopinath Bordoloi International airport will be operational 24x7 from March 25, giving a boost to air travel in the Northeast.

Airports Authority of India (AAI) chairman Guruprasad Mahapatra told reporters here on Monday that this was decided keeping in mind the increase in passengers at the airport in the past few years.

"The LGBI airport is now a thriving airport and it witnessed 37.2 per cent growth of passengers in 2016-17. This was much above the national average growth rate of 17 per cent. Guwahati being the hub of the Northeast, it has been decided to make the airport operational 24x7 and upgrade its facilities," Mahapatra said.

City-based AAI regional executive director D.K. Kamra said three airlines have agreed to operate night flights.
To Read the News in Full 30/01/18 Sumir Karmakar/Telegraph

Acumen Aviation looks to India for further growth

Irish aviation-leasing services company Acumen Aviation has seen business grow tenfold since it moved its business from India to Dublin in 2013.

The company is predicting even faster growth in the years to come as it builds on its evolving fleet-management business with the launch of a €1m programme to develop specialised machine-learning and artificial-intelligence-based tools to apply to the aviation market.

"Things that used to take us three days now take us half-a-day," said chief executive Alok Anand, who started the original business in Bangalore, India, before moving its headquarters to Ireland.

"This year, we are focusing on what we believe is our moonshot programme to automate the whole asset-management side of the business, using the latest technologies. Our customers love it, they get real efficiencies and real value out of it."

Those customers are some of the biggest aviation-leasing giants in the world, many of them based in Ireland, who own an increasing proportion of the planes used by airlines around the world.

Seaplanes can boost tourism in a big way: Spicejet CEO

Bullish on the growth prospects for seaplanes in India, leading airline Spicejet's CEO Ajay Singh has said this new mode of transport can boost the country's tourism sector in a big way as they can convert any pond into an airport and can make any river a runway.
Stating that SpiceJet was the first in the country to bring in this concept on a pilot basis, Singh said the use of seaplane by Prime Minister Narendra Modi during Gujarat elections has given it a further push.
"We can see a lot of interests from several states and the prime minister using a sea plane has given it a further push.

Trivandrum, Jaipur, Patna and Bagdogra airports to get enhanced CISF security

New Delhi: Considering an increase in passengers and flight services at Trivandrum, Jaipur, Patna and Bagdogra airports, the Centre has decided to enhance security by deploying more CISF personnel at these airports.

Confirming the development, a senior CISF official told The New Indian Express, “The Airports Authority of India (AAI) had written to us for augmentation of CISF strength at these airports because there was a significant increase in passenger and flights traffic. The Centre has issued an order sanctioning deployment of additional CISF personnel at these airports.” Though the official did not disclose the exact number, sources said around 100-300 additional personnel will be deployed at these airports.