The Aviation Weekly

1. Air Asia changes flight timings to Jaipur & Chandigarh in Winter schedule

As Air Asia India awaits delivery of its third aircraft VT-ATD, it has made changes to its network in winter schedule. The flights to Jaipur & Chandigarh have been swapped, mostly in view of fog at Chandigarh.

I5 1824 BLR0940 – 1235 IXC D

I5 1825 IXC1300 – 1600BLR D

I5 1722 BLR1630 – 1905JAI D

I5 1723 JAI1935 – 2200BLR D

IndiGo operates the Bengaluru – Chandigarh route non-stop and Jet Airways & SpiceJet offer a one stop service via Delhi, while IndiGo and Air Costa operate non-stop on the Bengaluru Jaipur sector.

2. IndiGo expands yet again

After launching flights to Bengaluru, Goa & Coimbatore from Delhi, IndiGo is expanding on the Delhi – Chennai sector with additional 2 flights each way. This will take the total count of flights on this sector by the airline to 7 Daily and will now have highest flights on this sector ahead of Air India – which operates 5x Daily, SpiceJet – which operates 4x Daily and Jet Airways – Which operates 3x Daily

6E602 DEL0830 – 1050MAA D

6E603 MAA1120 – 1425DEL D

6E547 DEL1345 – 1620MAA D

6E605 MAA1650 – 1930DEL D

3. Spicejet flight number changes

As part of network changes in Winter schedule, Spicejet has changed flight numbers for flights operated by its Q400 aircraft. Through flights like Delhi – Jabalpur – Mumbai, which is done by same aircraft and has same flight number, is now being changed to have two different flight numbers on the Delhi – Jabalpur and Jabalpur – Mumbai leg. The existing SG 2441 will now be SG 2451 from Delhi to Jabalpur and SG 2454 from Jabalpur to Mumbai.

The same has also been done on the Hyderabad – Pune – Goa leg. This would mean that when passenger purchases a Hyderabad – Goa ticket via Pune, the passenger would now have to carry two boarding cards instead of one. Additional Cost? Certainly yes!

4. Air Costa introduces flights on Chennai – Jaipur

Air Costa, which had some aircraft issues during the last few months, plans to come back strong in the winter schedule. The airline will operate non-stop flights between Chennai & Jaipur and will be the only airline to do so.

The flights would operate at below timings.

LB634 MAA1705 – 1940JAI D

LB635 JAI2005 – 2245MAA D

Currently, only IndiGo offers same aircraft services from Chennai to Jaipur

5. Jet Airways delays flights on Pune – Abu Dhabi & Ahmedabad – Abu Dhabi sector

Jet Airways, which was recently in news for expansion as well as issues related to pilot training and was operating A330 aircraft on the domestic sector to tide over pilot shortage has decided to delay the introduction of flights to Abu Dhabi.

The flights from Lucknow, Goa, Ahmedabad & Pune, which were to start on 14^th November will now be introduced in a phased manner, with the Ahmedabad & Pune link to be introduced later.

To get slots at Pune, the airline had gone to an extend of asking parking permission on the taxi-way, which was rightly rejected. The airline had kept its flights on the Delhi – Pune – Delhi sector on hold to accommodate the flight to Abu Dhabi.

As per latest GDS display, the night parked aircraft in Pune continues to operate to Bengaluru in the morning, and the additional flights planned on Delhi – Pune and Mumbai – Pune (International Connector) have been rolled back, all possibly due to pilot shortage