06. January 2007


Date: 06. Jan. 2007
Thiruvananthapuram, Jan 5 (IANS) All Air India flights from Kerala to the Middle East would soon be replaced by Air India Express flights without cargo facilities.
"Air India has been going positive on fleet acquisition and as a result AI Airbus would be replaced by Air India Express flights which are Boeing aircrafts. A final decision of this changeover has still not been taken," Air India manager H.M. Munaf told IANS here.
The direct losers of this changeover would be exporters of vegetables to most Middle-East airports.
But Munaf added they would make alternate arrangements for carrying the cargo from here and one option is to introduce Air India freighters.
"There are also plans to convert the existing Airbus aircrafts of Air India into cargo freighters. So the exporters need not worry. All these are options and soon a final decision would be taken."
The carrying capacity of Airbus 310 is 215 passengers and cargo up to 20 tonnes that fetches Air India close to Rs.1 billion a year.
Source: http://www.indianmuslims.info


Date: 06. Jan. 2007
Low-cost carrier Air Deccan is betting on assured occupancy agreements with India Inc for developing its feeder route network. Following a pilot deal with Welspun India on the Mumbai-Kandla sector - where the BK Goenka-led company is partly underwriting the daily service - Air Deccan is close to inking a similar deal with the Tatas on the yet-to-be-launched Kolkata-Jamshedpur flight.
The country’s second-largest carrier said it has received similar proposals from a host of corporates to start operations on low-volume sectors across the country. The no-frills carrier is also in talks with JSW Steel for underwriting 10 seats on the recently-launched Bangalore-Bellary route. The arrangement with the Tatas involves the group company Tata Steel that is preparing to open up its private airstrip in Jamshedpur.
Welspun India has signed an arrangement with Air Deccan for 13 seats per day on the Mumbai-Kandla route. Welspun deposits cash with the airline that issues tickets for the company at a specific price on a monthly basis. If the company doesn’t use the paid capacity, the airline releases the seat in the market 24 or 48 hours before the flight takes off. However, it still keeps a few contingency seats for Welspun. Incidentally, Mumbai-Kandla route has been registering a load factor of 95%.
“The entire Air Deccan model revolves around 80% load factor. The underwriting model is a hedge for us when our flights run below the benchmarked load factor on the low-volume routes. We invoke the underwriting facility only in such cases,” Deccan Aviation principal sales & marketing officer Samyukth Sridharan said.
“Aviation is integral to the ongoing economic growth, and improving regional connectivity with business is the key to bolstering operational efficiencies of the corporates,” Deccan Aviation MD Capt GR Gopinath told ET.
Air Deccan is in talks with various corporates for similar arrangements to operate services to Madhya Pradesh, Orissa, Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu. For instance, in Orissa, it could tap into the opportunities presented by the mining industry for operating into the hinterlands. Interestingly, the government bodies in Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra too have expressed interest in underwriting flight operations even though nothing is definite yet.
Meanwhile, Air Deccan - which is planning to carry 7.4 million passengers in the financial year - is planning to add new destinations such as Sholapur, Udaipur, Jodhpur, Dimapur and Shillong to its network this year. Mr Sridharan said, “Varanasi is high on our list and we intend to launch flights to Varanasi by the year end. Orissa belt will be on the anvil in 12-15 months and we are evaluating Leh as well.”
Source: http://deccan-airways-news.newslib.com


Date: 06. Jan. 2007
The only man convicted in the Air India bombing is applying for parole just months before he’s to face a perjury charge.
The National Parole Board will set a hearing date for next month for Inderjit Singh Reyat.
He faces a perjury charge in May for testimony he gave during the Air India bombing trial in which two men were acquitted in the 1985 terror attack.
Reyat’s statutory release date was in June last year and by law, all parolees have annual detention reviews after they’ve passed that release date.
A board turned down Reyat’s bid for parole last March, saying Reyat tried to downplay his role in the airliner bombing which killed 329 people.
Reyat was sentenced to five years for manslaughter after he admitted to buying bomb-making supplies used in the terrorist act.
Source: http://thechronicleherald.ca


Date: 06. Jan. 2007
BANGKOK (Reuters) - Jet Airways Ltd., India's biggest domestic airline, said it will expand its international operations with new flights to Bangkok in late January and flights to the United States late this year.
Jet Airways said on Tuesday it plans to launch a regular U.S. service in August, flying to Newark, New Jersey, and to San Francisco via Shanghai in October, executives said.
The airline will use eight new Boeing 777s and five Airbus 330s, already ordered, on its international routes this year on top of six Boeing 737s for its Indian domestic service, chairman Naresh Goyal told reporters.
"Our international operations will grow to account for about 50 percent of our total revenues in a few years," Goyal said, announcing Jet Airways' 14 weekly flights between Bangkok, Delhi and Kolkata.
Jet Airways has flights from India to London, Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, Colombo, and Kathmandu.
The 13-year-old airline said in a statement it planned to expand its current fleet to 89 aircraft by March 2009 from 60 now.
Of its current 60 aircraft, 46 are Boeing 737s.
Jet Airways would finance its current and future aircraft purchases by a combination of its own internal funds, commercial loans and possible future share floats, Goyal said without giving further details.
The airline raised $434 million in an initial public offering in 2005.
It reported a $26 million loss for the six months ended September 30 after years of healthy profits.
"The loss was largely due to the initial investment we made for our expanded service to London. It normally takes any airline a year to be profitable on a new route," Jet Airways Vice President Guarang Shetty said.
Jet is investing $2.5 billion in new aircraft and training over the next three years and has said it would cut costs through greater on-line ticket sales and better staff management.
It said last week it had ordered 10 Boeing 787-8 wide-bodied aircraft for delivery between July 2011 and December 2012.
Source: http://in.today.reuters.com