Aviation Summary - Week#3 of July

                                           Aviation Summary – last two weeks

Back after a short break, which I took with my better half to explore the Leh-Ladakh regions of northern state of Jammu & Kashmir. It was sad to hear about the incidents of MH-17 and the geo politics around it, as I returned to telephone and internet coverage.

A lot of things on the network front, especially after the joint press conference by Etihad & Jet Airways. The focus apparently will be Network Planning for domestic routes and Jet will shy away from loss making routes. By stating this, I believe, Jet is inviting more trouble on the domestic front. Competition now knows how to make Jet run away from a route, just add capacity when they can in terms of aircraft availability and finances and make Jet leave the market and go. Classic case of is Bhubaneshwar, where there was minimal competition and Jet vacated the market, which it was dominant from Sahara days. The reason Jet has shown some profitability on the international sector is because they have been stable for a while, unlike the domestic scene where they tend to change their network every 3 weeks or so.

More network changes by Jet and others are covered here.

Jet Airways launches Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon) & increases flights to Bangkok

Jetairways has increased focus towards East and there is some international expansion taking place including launch of a new station – Ho Chi Minh, the capital of Vietnam.

Jetairways will now have three flights a day between Delhi and Bangkok & Mumbai and Bangkok. It is surprising how Jet is being able to sustain Bangkok amidst the chaos caused by the Military rule and dip in tourist traffic.

9W64 DEL0910 -1445BKK1545 – 1715SGN D 737

9W63 SGN1815 – 1945BKK2045 – 2355DEL D 737

The third daily Mumbai – Bangkok flight will operate as below,

9W60 BOM1225 – 1810BKK D 737

9W61 BKK0815 – 1115BOM D 737

Jet Airways re-launches Chennai – Pune sector with services to Ahmedabad

Jet airways which pulled out of the Chennai – Pune sector in April, have decided to re-launch the sector effective mid-august. The flights earlier were operated by mainline Jet airways but will now be operated as Jet Airways Konnect service and would continue onwards to Ahmedabad.

9W2491 MAA0945 – 1130PNQ x6 737

9W2491 PNQ1200 – 1315AMD x6 737

9W2492 AMD1345 – 1500PNQ x6 737

9W2492 PNQ1530 – 1715MAA x6 737

Pune – Ahmedabad is operated by IndiGo and Spicejet with both operating the flight 6x weekly.

Pune – Chennai sector is crowded as well, with IndiGo operating triple daily, Spicejet & GoAir operating Daily and Air India operating 6x weekly

Jet airways gave a connection to Ahmedabad and Vadodara via Indore till recently from Pune.

Interesting question is where is this capacity coming from? It has come from cancelling flights on Chennai – Bengaluru – Indore route, which operates at below timings.

9W2390 MAA0945 – 1045BLR D 737

9W2390 BLR1115 – 1310IDR D 737

9W2391 IDR1340 – 1535BLR D 737

9W2391 BLR1615 – 1715MAA D 737

Notice the slots being same at a slot constraint airport like Chennai.

Air Asia launches second daily to Kochi & Goa; IndiGo takes the battle one level up

As Air Asia India announced launch of its second daily flight on Bengaluru – Kochi sector, IndiGo has responded by launching two more flights on this sector, taking their flights on this sector to 20x weekly each way. The second daily Bengaluru – Kochi flights are effective 14^th August.

I51129 BLR2140 – 2240COK D

I51130 COK2310 – 0010BLR D

I am expecting that these flights will soon be re-timed when the second aircraft arrives or pulled out completely.

The second daily flight to Goa from Bengaluru operates as below,

I51322 BLR0620 – 0735GOI D

I51323 GOI0805 – 0915BLR D

IndiGo will operate this new rotation effective 28^th August.

6E411 HYD0705 – 0810BLR D

6E411 BLR0840 – 0940COK D

6E422 COK1010 – 1110BLR D

6E422 BLR1205 – 1445CCU D

6E425 CCU1615 – 1850BLR D

6E425 BLR1920 – 2020COK D

6E412 COK2050 – 2150BLR D

6E412 BLR2220 – 2320HYD D

Air Asia launches two more destinations

Air Asia India tweeted about launching two new destinations, Jaipur and Chandigarh. This is an indication of their second aircraft being inducted soon, likely by end of August.

I51722 BLR0945 – 1220JAI D

I51723 JAI1245 – 1515BLR D

I51824 BLR1545 – 1840IXC D

I51825 IXC1905 – 2205BLR D

AirAsia India will become the only operator to fly non-stop from Bengaluru to Chandigarh and third operator after IndiGo and Air Costa to fly non-stop on the Bengaluru – Jaipur sector

Spicejet withdraws  aircraft from its fleet

Spicejet has withdrawn VT-SPS, a Boeing B737-800 aircraft (MSN 34905) from active service. The aircraft was named Mustard and was 2007 vintage. This aircraft was ferried to Istanbul on 17^th July. Sister bird, VT-SPJ, named Mint in the Spicejet fleet was ferried to Istanbul on 20^th June and has since been operating with Russian carrier Orenair as VQ-BUF.

Spicejet Cancels flights to Kabul

With growing threats, an occasion where aircraft, crew and passengers were at the airport when Kabul airport was attached, Spicejet has taken a decision to discontinue flights to Kabul. With this, only Air India will continue its Kabul flights, while a lot of Airlines based in Afghanistan continue to operate to India including the national carrier Ariana and private carriers, Safi and Kam.

Go Air goes double daily on Nagpur – Kolkata

GoAir, which recently launched flights from Nagpur to Kolkata, becoming only the second operator on the route, after IndiGo, has quickly increased frequency on the sector, offering a morning Kolkata – Nagpur and an evening Nagpur – Kolkata flight, which bothways is extended to Mumbai.

In the process, GoAir has added Kolkata as a new base, shifting one aircraft from Delhi. It has also pulled out of Delhi – Nagpur – Delhi sector. This flight will be its first connection between Kolkata and Mumbai, which it will now provide as a one stop via Nagpur

The airline is less likely to be noticed by larger rival IndiGo on the sector, since IndiGo has larger battles to fight in the south with Air Asia

The new flights of Go Air operate as below

G8 141 CCU0625 – 0815NAG D

G8 142 NAG2045 – 2225CCU D

GoAir defers delivery of its 20^th aircraft

As first images appeared of VT-GOS, Go Air’s 20^th aircraft with all white fuselage, there was speculation if GoAir would do something unique like spicejet. However, the aircraft was intentionally left white, so that it could be transferred to the lessor, which in turn has gone to Frontier airlines,USA.

There also were questions, on why GoAir intends to start international flights only in 2015 and not immediately. This answers it now, the 20^th aircraft is not in fleet and the 5/20 rule still exists.

Mumbai gets a new carrier

With Emirates launching A380 flights to Mumbai, it is now turn of Fly Dubai to add Mumbai on their network map effective Winter’14.

Flights will be operated 5x weekly and by recently launched dual class aircraft.

Tata – SIA aircraft takes to the skies

As MSN6223 A320 with Sharklets took to the skies on 10^th July, there were reports that this aircraft would be registered as VT-TTB and will be the first aircraft for the airline which is planning proving flights in September.