Airbus to disclose sales figures Monday; Boeing may be No. 1 again

Seattle: On Monday the aircraft manufacturing industry will find out whether Boeing or Airbus is number one in orders for 2010. Boeing issued its numbers on January 6th, with a total of 530 new orders. Airbus is expected to fall short, perhaps well short, of that number.
The European airplane company hasn't discussed numbers since early December. If the forecast holds, Monday will put Boeing back in the number one position as the world's biggest plane maker.
The majority of Boeing and Airbus orders will surround the 737 and the A320. Airbus is trying to start 2011 off with a bang, playing up an agreement to sell up to 180 A320s to India's low cost carrier IndiGo. This does not appear to be an official order yet, but rather a memo of understanding, which could make 150 of those jets new A320 NEOS, which stands for New Engine Option.
14/01/11 Glenn Farley/King 5/NWCN

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Bengaluru bids goodbye to one of its finest fliers

Bengaluru mourned the death of one its finest flying men when Wing Cdr Vikas Jetley, 43, of the IAF's Sarang aerobatic team passed away in Delhi on January 11 after being in a coma for four long years. He is survived by his wife Shalini and two children.
The Advanced Light Helicopter, which Vikas Sarang piloted crashed at Yelahanka Air Force Station five days prior to the 2007 Aero India Show. His co-pilot Sqn Ldr Priye Sharma died on the spot. Vikas Jetley suffered serious head injuries and slipped into a coma from which he never recovered.
He was treated at the Command Hospital in Bengaluru for two-and-a-half years and then shifted to the Air Force Hospital, Hindon.
The helicopter piloted by Vikas Jetley was on a routine practice flight on February 2, 2007 when it performed a hard left turn manoeuvre at low altitude and crashed. Pilots and engineers who witnessed the crash can never forget it.
“When the crash happened I was in the city and it came as a shock to us all.
All ALH operations were suspended after the crash for many months. It is a sad day when we lose one pilot and see another in a coma,” recalled an engineer at Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd.
14/01/11 Deccan Chronicle

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India’s private airlines land back in profit

Mumbai: Some of India’s money-losing private airlines declared soaring profits in the December quarter, beating analysts’ estimates and indicating strongly that the country’s ailing aviation industry is on the cusp of economic recovery after a turbulent year.
Jet Airways, the country’s largest private carrier, posted a profit of 1.05 billion rupees (Dh83 million) in the December quarter, its first profit in three quarters, while Spice Jet, the second-largest low-fare airline, posted a profit of 1.08bn rupees.
This was just the news the industry was waiting for after India’s private airlines collectively lost US$2bn (Dh7.34bn) last year.
Both airlines, which reported a loss of 10.32bn rupees and 3.52bn rupees respectively in the 2008-2009 fiscal year, were buoyed by improving passenger numbers and the low cost of aviation fuel.
Kingfisher Airlines, the second-largest private carrier, posted an operating profit of 110m rupees, although its net losses touched 4.2bn rupees.
The global airline industry has been hit by a severe downturn, although Asia-Pacific carriers are expected to post the most dramatic financial improvements this year, the International Air Transport Association said.
India’s aviation market, the ninth-largest in the world and fourth-largest in terms of domestic passenger volume, expanded by 7.5 per cent last year compared with the previous year, the airline regulator said.
Passenger volume surged by 3.07 million last year, taking the total number of passengers to 43.8 million. The number had contracted to 42.8 million in 2008. Some 4.4 million people travelled by plane last month alone, a 35 per cent increase on December 2008.
“The airline sector is exhibiting strong recovery, not just due to an increase in passenger traffic but also bottoming of yields,” said S Arun, a senior director at DSP Merril Lynch, a global brokerage.
But the industry still faces several challenges that could dampen the new-found exuberance, analysts say. Despite the impressive numbers, airlines are cautiously optimistic.
30/01/10 Anuj Chopra/The National, UAE

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Indian travellers seeking cheaper flights, hotels

Indian travellers are looking for low cost air travel options and cheap hotel rooms as the domestic tourism industry starts to pick up in the wake of the ongoing economic recovery.
This trend will pick up pace in the coming years, speakers at a seminar 'The Challenge of Change' in tourism at the ongoing SATTE-ITB 2010 travel fair said here Friday.
The tourism, aviation and travel segments - the three components that make up the industry - are learning to listen to customers, said Aditya Ghosh, president, Indigo Airlines.
'We are now listening to customers. The last three years have shown that we are no different from the world and customers' expectations and profiles have changed,' he said.
Over the last 18 months, travel and tourism trade have been receiving tremendous support from business travellers - much more than the leisure segment - and they are looking for variety in their itineraries and transport.
According to statistics furnished by Confederation of Indian Industry at SATTE, business travel bookings are expected to show a gentle upswing in 2010.
Business travellers with tighter purses are looking for bargains and budget hotels, the industry group said. It is a time of recovery, after the industry logged a 15 percent drop last year.
30/01/10 Bombay News.Net

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Air miles: Decoding the world's largest currency

Airlines are nowadays aggressively pitching their frequent flyer programs (FFPs or air miles) to earn passenger loyalty. The funda is simple—while passengers fly more than usual to earn a free journey, the airline gets to boost its revenue kitty and brand image.
Yet, with personal lives becoming busier than ever before, it’s practically impossible for travellers to keep track of air miles. A person in the corporate world works for at least eight hours a day, travels two times a month, manages family’s money matters—so, how can one expect them to be aware of what airline loyalty programs have on offer and how can they maximise the travel experience at minimal expense.
Today there are over 70 airline FFPs worldwide, and a complicated network of airline alliances and partnerships. In India, Kingfisher Airlines, Indian Airlines and Jet Airways have popular FFPs. But there is little awareness on effective utilisation of airline loyalty programs. Rough estimates show that more than half the air miles generated are lost due to inadequate information, unfriendly redemption processes and travellers’ preference to take the best flight, time-wise as well as price wise.
Globally, airline FFPs are profit centres, that is, their revenues earned from sale of miles to partners outstrips the costs incurred in running the FFP and providing for redemption. Due to lower levels of awareness about loyalty programs in India, however, most FFPs here are cost centres.
However, for the best possible utilisation, it’s advisable for air travellers to consolidate the miles into a single account to avoid miles breakage and maximise chances of getting an award ticket.
31/01/10 Aman Dhall/Economic Times

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It is flight to safety for airline companies

The third quarter numbers published by airlines have revived hopes that these companies aren't too far from a financial take-off.
From a loss of Rs 214.18 crore in December 2008, Jet Airways ended the December 2009 quarter with healthy profits of Rs 105.80 crore. SpiceJet posted profits of Rs 108.9 crore for the quarter, as against losses of Rs 17.96 crore in the same period last year.
However, Kingfisher Airlines continued to suffer losses this quarter also. It recorded losses of Rs 419.96 crore, not making much headway on reducing the red spots in its profit and loss account, when compared to last year.
Trimmed fleet sizes and rationalisation of costs have aided airline companies this quarter, even as discounted tariffs continued.
Available seats-per-passenger-km for Jet Airways and Kingfisher Airlines were down by 2.9 per cent and 7.5 per cent respectively year-on-year. Revenue per passenger km were up by 17.4 per cent for Jet Airways, while Kingfisher Airlines' improved by 14.8 per cent.
In a bid to rationalise operations, most airlines have resorted to increasing flights on frequently travelled routes and pulled back from less popular destinations. Discounts offered by the airline operators to attract customers also played a vital role in boosting traffic by 13.8 percentage points for Jet Airways and 14.8 percentage points for Kingfisher Airlines. Nevertheless, the companies witnessed 4.64 per cent and 6.25 per cent dip in their sales incomes, respectively, during the quarter.
30/01/10 S. Hamsini Amritha/Business Line

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Punjab becomes first state to set up aviation MRO hub

Chandigarh: Punjab has become the first state in the country to setup Aviation Maintenance; Repair and Overhaul (MRO) hub at Rupnagar. Besides, a new Green field International Airport (Aerotropolis) near Ludhiana would come up in an area covering 3000 acres and would be the first green-field international airport in north India to be set-up in the private sector.
This was disclosed to the State Advisory Committee on Civil Aviation, constituted by the Punjab Vidhan Sabha, in its meting held here on Friday to review the progress of ongoing projects of civil aviation in the state. Presiding over the meeting the Civil Aviation Minister Punjab Dr. Upinderjit Kaur said that the MRO would be developed over an area of 50 acre near Rupnagar at a cost of Rs. 30 crore. The upcoming MRO hub would be "OEM approved maintenance centre. The MRO hub would be instrumental to generate tremendous employment both direct and indirect in the field of civil aviation besides promoting heli-tourism in Punjab in a big way. Besides this, the hub would also act as a catalyst to give fillip in raising the standards of flying at flying academies in Patiala and Amritsar, she said.
30/01/10 Punjab Newsline

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Vijay Kelkar pitches for full privatisation in aviation sectors

Mumbai: Finance commission chairman Vijay Kelkar today pitched for complete privatisation in certain sectors such as airline industry to ensure a level-playing field for all players to equip them face the global competition.
Kelkar, delivering a lecture here, said the government has to re-engineer its portfolio composition to facilitate more private participation and instead focus on sectors like rural roads and public-health infrastructure.
"There is a spectrum of assets, ranging from airlines to rural roads, where Government ownership is inadvisable for airlines but required for rural roads or public health infrastructure," Kelkar said today.
"Most of us would agree that the airline industry works quite well as a purely private affair. All over the world governments have got out of airlines," Kelkar said.
Arguing that the government's role as a regulator and player in sectors such as aviation might dent the confidence of private players as this may lead to conflict of interests, Kelkar said.
29/01/10 PTI/Daily News & Analysis

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Four days on, Austrian paraglider still under surveillance

Rajkot: For four days now, a paragliding enthusiast from Austria has been kept grounded and confined to the pilgrim town of Dwarka, where he had to make a forced landing after gliding his way through the coastal belt of Goa, Mumbai, Daman and Gujarat.
Peter Nazbet (37), apparently had no valid license. He told The Indian Express on Friday: “Paragliding is an international sport; I do not intend to harm any one. It is just a form of recreation for me.”
Although there were intelligence warning about possible air-borne terror strikes, Peter was let off twice by the Gujarat Police at Bhavnagar and Madhavpur, after perfunctory interrogation soon after he had landed there earlier. The Dwarka police, however, during the verification of his documents, found that his paragliding license, limited to Goa, had expired in 2005.
The police said they are waiting for an official confirmation from the Director General of Civil Aviation and the Indian Air Force (IAF) whether Peter had permission to fly.
Till then, he will be kept confined to Dwarka “under surveillance”, the police said.
30/01/10 Hiral Dave/Indian Express

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Centre unhappy over NE civil aviation scene

New Delhi: In the face of serious misgivings over the poor air service in the North-East and blatant flouting of the Route Dispersal Guide (RDG) by the private air operators, the Centre has finally swung into action opting for a major policy shift. A high-level meeting presided over by Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister TKA Nair and attended by senior officials of the concerned central ministries including Union Home Secretary G K Pillai recently took stock of the prevalent civil aviation scenario and was quite unhappy with the state of affairs, sources said.
The initiative by the PMO came in response to a complaint by Ministry DoNER over poor air connectivity in the North-east and flouting of civilaviation norms by private air operators. The Ministry was equally critical of the services provided by the state carrier Indian Airlines pointing to the below average performance of the regionalair service, it is operating in the North Eastern States.
Sources said the meeting also joined by Secretary DoNER, Civil Aviation amongst others took several vital decisions. The move to select a regional operator has been abandoned for good.
The Central Government is doing some rethinking on the vexed problem dogging the civil sector in the region. With no takers from the private air operators to run the regionalair service, government is mulling introduction of non-schedule operator (NSO) in place of schedule operator, said an official.
29/01/10 Kalyan Barooah/Assam Tribune

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GMR to assemble planes next

Hyderabad: GMR Hyderabad International Airport Ltd (GHIAL) is setting up an aircraft manufacturing unit near the international terminal that it operates near the city, in a joint venture with an unnamed European major.
“We are talking to an European company, which is a leading aircraft manufacturer. We are hopeful of signing an agreement in the next 1-2 months,” Ravindran Devagunam, COO, of the aviation and aerospace business of the GHIAL, told DNA on Thursday.
The manufacturing activity would be confined to smaller aircraft initially. “We are looking assembling these small aircraft first,” Devagunam said.
GHIAL is setting up an aerospace special economic zone across 250 acres at the sprawling 5,500-acre airport complex.
In fact, the European company is working on this deal as part of its offset obligation for defence contracts bagged in India.
The GMR group is planning to convert this aircraft major into an anchor client at the manufacturing hub at the SEZ.
“We are talking to one more aircraft company. But, the European company would be the first to come and hopefully it would be the first with which we would be signing a deal,” he said.
The investments and size of the activity are yet to be determined.
In fact, the SEZ is one of the plans GMR has to monetize the property it has at the international airport.
29/01/10 KV Ramana/Daily News & Analysis

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Airline revenue at cost of flier safety? High Court seeks reply

Mumbai: Air passengers’ security compromised for the sake of generating more revenue, air traffic congestion, fuel wastage — the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) and the Federation of Indian Airlines (FIA) were on Thursday asked to reply to the High Court on these allegations.
A division bench of Justice F I Rebello and Justice J H Bhatia gave the direction on a petition by Resources for Aviation Redressal Association. The judges observed that people are charged extra by airlines. “This is the reality of life,” Justice Rebello said.
The petition says fuel is wasted though the authorities are empowered to curtail such wastage, caused due to delays in getting landing clearance. They are also neglecting the alarming rate of air congestion, the petition states.
It adds that that current operational policies of Mumbai International Airport Ltd (MIAL) have “minimised and even jeopardized” passengers’ security in the interest of generating more revenue. It cites several recent, near-misses and says airlines operators under the FIA are ignoring safety norms. The counsel for MIAL said the DGCA decides flight slots; MIAL only runs the airport.
29/01/10 Esha Roy/ExpressIndia

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Schedules of 200 flights disrupted; passengers stranded by fog

New Delhi: Thousands of air travellers were today stranded at the IGI airport here after thick fog blanketed the national capital throwing schedules of over 200 flights out of gear.
The Delhi airport witnessed 54 cancellations, the highest so far this fog season, and 34 flights (21 domestic and 12 international) were diverted to Jaipur, Lucknow, Mumbai, Kolkata, Bhopal, Bangalore, Chennai and Lahore after the runway visibility dropped to 50 metres.
A Malaysian Airlines flight (MH 191) from Kuala Lumpur was diverted to Lahore around 10.30 pm yesterday when the visibility was around 50 metres.
Delays and diversions of flights caused problems not only for the airlines but also for the passengers who had wait for long hours at the airport or in the aircraft before their flight were cancelled.
A Jetlite Kochi-Delhi flight landed here 18-hours after it took off from Kochi at 6.30 pm last evening.
Dense fog started to envelope the airport around 8.30 pm last night due to which the runway visibility was reduced to 50 metres and the general visibility to zero.
The runway visibility hovered between 50 metres and 100 metres throughout the night and early this morning, an airport official said.
Airport authorities implemented low visibility procedures (LVP) around 7 pm last evening as the runway visibility of the new runway deteriorated to less than 800 metres. It was finally terminated around 11 am today, after 16 hours.
A total of 167 flights operated during the LVP, of which 81 under CAT-I instrument landing system, two using CAT-II, 16 with CAT-III A and 68 using CAT-III B ILS, the official said.
With runway visibility hovering between 50 metres and 100 metres for most of the time, no flight could take-off as the minimum limit for a flight to take off during low visibility has been fixed to 150 metres by the Indian civil aviation regulator, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA).
27/01/10 Zee News

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Season’s most intense fog hits airport

New Delhi Celebrating the 61st Republic Day, the Capital sat amid zero visibility on Tuesday morning as the season’s most intense fog stretched for over five hours.
The year now looks set to break the record of recent years while counting the highest number of dense fog hours in the month of January: the highest this decade was in January 2003, with 168 hours. This January, Delhi has already seen 148 hours of dense fog.
According to the weatherman, similar or worse conditions are likely to cloud the sky till the first week of February.
At the IGI Airport, flight operations remained suspended for nearly six hours — first due to low visibility and then due to an hour’s closure of airspace for the flypast during the Republic Day parade till about 12.15 pm.
“The spell of dense fog at IGI Airport on Tuesday morning was the worst in terms of intensity,” IGI Met department director-in-charge R K Jenamani said. “The runway visibility was consistently between 50 and 75 metres from 5.30 am to 11 am.”
He said the conditions do not seem to be improving, with a consistent pattern of weak winds over northern India: “This is an extra topical phenomenon when temperatures also continue to be low persistently.”
The Met department predicts the situation might improve after Thursday (January 28). “The incoming western disturbances are becoming more active, leading to an increase in moisture in the air. Humidity is already 100 per cent,” Jenamani said.
While flights can land in near-zero visibility, the mandatory take-off minima to be followed by pilots has been set by the Directorate General of Civil Aviation at 150 metres.
27/01/10 Express India

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Identity of air passengers cannot be disclosed: CIC

New Delhi: The list of passengers on a flight cannot be given under the RTI Act as no public interest is served in its disclosure, the Central Information Commission has held while rejecting the plea of an ex-Navy official accused of murdering a woman two years ago.
Currently lodged in Mumbai's Arthur Road Prison, Manish Thakur is accused of shooting his girlfriend 24-year-old Kaushambi Layek, an employee of Tata Consultancy Service, whose body was found from the honeymoon suite of a hotel on May 14, 2007, where both had allegedly checked-in. Police allege that Thakur had escaped to Goa after committing the crime.
Thakur sought details of passengers travelling on Indian Airlines flights from Mumbai to Goa on May 13, and 14, 2007 under the Right to Information Act.
"The appellant has neither indicated as to how he is affected in the matter or what is the public interest in disclosure of the details of passengers, the denial of information u/s 8(1)(j) of the Act is therefore justified," the Commission said.
27/01/10 Zee News

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Indian aviation needs to focus on basics to take off

New Delhi : After being in trouble for more than a year and losing Rs 10,000 crore, the Indian aviation industry is looking up.
It should continue doing so if airlines refrain from adding ‘unnecessary’ capacity and getting into another fare war.
The losses of three listed airlines — Jet Airways, Kingfisher Airlines and SpiceJet — in the third quarter of this financial year fell by 37 per cent to Rs 205 crore from Rs 645 crore during the same period last year.
SpiceJet and Jet Airways improved their financials and incurred profit but Kingfisher increased its losses. SpiceJet had a loss of Rs 17.96 crore during the same period last year and Jet Airways then had a loss of Rs 214.18 crore.
Kingfisher increased its losses to Rs 420 crore from Rs 413 crore during the same period last year.
The airlines that managed a profit did so because of constant effort to cut flab. “The airlines have been cutting flab for around a year and it has paid. Kingfisher has made operational profit and losses might have come from international operations, which they started recently,” said Kapil Kaul, India head of the Cen-tre for Asia Pacific Aviat-ion.
“Increasing their yields will be the key to growth,” said Rajeev Batra, executive director, KPMG, the financial and business advisory agency.
27/01/10 Mihir Mishra/Business Standard

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Pvt carriers may soon have to fly to more areas in Northeast

New Delhi: The government has decided to plug an existing loophole in the civil aviation guidelines that allows domestic airlines to report high compliance with the North-Eastern Region (NER) flying quota without undertaking actual flying into the region.
At present, an airline could end a flight in the commercially viable destination of Bagdogra, West Bengal, to meet the 10 per cent NER connectivity quota. However, airlines will soon have to make additional flights into the poorly connected region. In a recent meeting between the civil aviation ministry and development of Northeast region (DoNER) ministry, the two sides decided to remove Bagdogra from the list of destinations that airlines could fly to meet their NER connectivity quota.
“Private airlines have been taking advantage of this loophole and have avoided flying into NER. Now, the government has taken an in-principle decision to drop Bagdogra, until now considered part of the NER region, from the list of destinations for meeting the NER flying quota,” said a senior government official. The government will evaluate the technical feasibility before it notifies the decision.
Meanwhile, domestic airlines will be given some grace period to adjust their future flying schedules accordingly, the official added. “The move will considerably impact private airlines and will bring down their compliance from the current levels if Bagdogra is excluded,” said a senior airline official, on condition of anonymity.
25/01/10 Smita Aggarwal/Express India

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Uncertainty prevails over recovery by domestic carriers

Mumbai: Despite expectations of financial improvements for some domestic carriers in the three months ended December, civil aviation executives and experts are wondering if the industry has flown past cloudy weather.
With all its festivals and holidays, the December quarter forms the peak travelling season—and that is expected to reflect in the account books of a number of airlines affected by the aviation downturn of the past year and a half. But worries over volatile jet fuel costs and price competition have dampened some of the exuberance.
On Thursday, Kingfisher Airlines Ltd kicked off the earnings season with an operating profit of Rs11 crore for its domestic operations, although it posted a net loss of Rs419.96 crore.
SpiceJet Ltd posted a record profit of Rs108.9 crore for the same quarter. Jet Airways (India) Ltd, which will announce its results on Monday, is expected to post a profit of around Rs10 crore.
While analysts who track the industry are upbeat, airline executives remain cautiously optimistic. Some are downright sceptical about whether the numbers are an indication of better times to come. They warn that even minor changes in the business environment could scuttle any hopes of recovery.
25/01/10 P. R. Sanjai/Live Mint

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MAS unit makes major inroads into India’s MRO sector

Chennai: MAS Aerospace Engineering Sdn Bhd (MAE), a unit of Malaysia Airlines, is making major inroads into one of the fastest-growing maintenance, repair and overhaul (MRO) market in the world through its 50:50 joint venture with GMR Hyderabad International Airport Ltd (GHIAL) in India.
Formed last year, the joint-venture company, MAS-GMR Aerospace Engineering Co Ltd (MAG) has signed MRO deals with two major airlines in the country this month.
One of them is with low-cost carrier SpiceJet while the other is with Jet Airways group. And these agreements were signed despite the fact that MAG’s MRO facilities are currently still under construction.
The facilities at Rajiv Gandhi International Airport in Hyderabad will be completed in the second quarter next year.
The values of the agreements are not stated, but it is believed they will bring in quite siginificant revenues for MAG once the agreements come into effect.
This is particularly so with the works to be done for Jet Airways group.
Jet Airways operates a fleet of more than 100 aircraft of various models. It is the second-largest airline in India after Air India.
It was a win-win situation as the MRO agreement with MAG could result in a cost-savings of up to US$820mil for Jet Airways over the span of 10 years, said Jet Airways executive director Saroj K. Datta.
The agreements with SpiceJet, which involves three years of maintenance and support works, could come with a value ranging from US$4mil to US$12mil.
25/01/10 Cecilia Kok/The Star, Malaysia

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ASEAN wants to firm up open skies regime with India

Chennai: The Association of Southeast Asian Nations is keen on firming up an “open skies regime” with India, ASEAN Deputy Secretary-General S. Pushpanathan said here on Saturday.
An open skies regime with India would enhance air connectivity, which was key to integration of regional markets, he said participating in a plenary session on “From Regional Integration to Global Partnerships” at the Partnership Summit of the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII).
The ASEAN-India Aviation Cooperation Framework sets a preface for moving to an India-ASEAN open skies regime.
While ASEAN expected to firm up the open skies regime with India in “the next few years,” it expected to finalise a similar pact with China by year-end, Mr. Pushpanathan said.
Pointing out that one of the key trends was an increasing volume of trade within the region, the official said ASEAN was also looking at a wider Free Trade Agreement (FTA) involving India, Japan, China, Australia and New Zealand.
A “mutual recognition arrangement” was being mooted to ensure freer movement of labour within ASEAN, he said.
24/01/10 M Dinesh Varma/The Hindu

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NSG prepares for hijack threat

New Delhi: India has put its elite commando force, the National Security Guard (NSG), on high alert and stationed helicopters at its base for quick movement of troops in view of “credible” intelligence that Pakistan-based terrorist groups plan to hijack an Indian commercial aircraft in south Asia.
The Home Ministry had sounded an alert — reportedly based on Western intelligence — on Wednesday and followed it up with another on Thursday.
According to the inputs, groups linked to the Al Qaeda, Lashkar and Jamaat-ud-Dawa plan to hijack an Air India plane operating in any of the SAARC countries — India, Nepal, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Bhutan, Maldives, Afghanistan, Pakistan.
“Helicopters from the Border Security Force have already been requisitioned by the NSG,” a ministry official who didn’t want to be named said.
To make the skies safer, sky marshals (armed NSG commandos in plainclothes) will be placed on flights believed to be high risk and all those boarding flights will be frisked at ladder point.
“Hundreds of NSG men are already deployed on flights operating in sensitive airports. The deployment is in large numbers but we can’t share further details,” a senior NSG official told HT.
23/01/10 Manish Tiwari/Aloke Tikku/Hindustan Times

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Rajeev Joins Jet Set

Entrepreneur-politician Rajeev Chandrashekar is the latest to buy a personal jet aircraft in the country. The restless entrepreneur now has an office in the sky.
Rajeev Chandrashekar’s Bombardier Challenger 300 aircraft arrived in December from Canada, flown in by an American pilot Eddinson Lopez (Eddie Lopez) and co-pilot Sanjeev Agarwal. The silver colour aircraft is a 9-seater (apart from 3 crew) and has plush beige interiors.
The private jet cost Rajeev Rs 140 crore and it has been registered under his company Jupiter Aviation. Since the state-of-the art aircraft arrived in India, he has done a few trips to Delhi and Mumbai. The aircraft is parked at HAL airport.
It has the latest generation glass cockpit, a flying range of 3,500 nautical miles (6,475 kms) with luxurious cabin fitting and customised music, sound and video system.
The running expenses of a jet are very high and depending on the type of aircraft, the fuel costs alone can be anywhere between Rs 20,000 to Rs 50,000 per hour.
Added to the expenses would be salaries of pilot, co pilot, air hostess, engineer, technician, maintenance costs, parking charges, hangarage and this could be upwards of Rs one crore per month.
23/01/10 KR Sreenivas/Bangalore Mirror

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Praful Patel promises more international flights from Gujarat

Ahmedabad: Civil Aviation Minister Praful Patel on Friday assured the people of Gujarat about the improvement in air connectivity of the state with the rest of the world.
Inaugurating the 4th Vishwa Gujarati Samaj (VGS) conference in Ahmedabad, Patel said, “We will try to have more direct flights from Ahmedabad to major foreign cities.”
He said this after VGS president Krishnakant Vakaria requested the minister to look into the issues of the Gujarati community living in foreign countries. The major demands put forward by Vakaria were to develop Bhuj, Rajkot and Surat as international airports besides having more direct flights from Ahmedabad to London, Sydney and Oman.
The conference is being organised here as part of the of Swarnim Gujarat festivities (Golden Jubilee celebrations of statehood). The three-day conference began on Friday with an inaugural function followed by a cultural programme.
23/01/10 Indian Express

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SC notices to Jet, others on service tax dues to AAI

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Friday issued notices to Jet Airways (India) Ltd, Flemingo Duty Free Shops, Thomas Cook and others on an application by the Airports Authority of India seeking recovery of tax dues on airport services from those firms.
A bench headed by justice Aftab Alam sought reply from Jet Airways, Flemingo Duty Free Shops and 27 others on the AAI’s application seeking recovery of service tax dues of more than Rs 18.66 crore from them.
AAI had earlier moved the apex court seeking transfer of petitions pending before various high courts of Delhi, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Kerala, Madras, and Bombay on the issue.
The Supreme Court in April 2007 issued notices regarding the transfer petitions and stayed further proceedings in various high courts.
Various companies, including Jet Airways, Flemingo, Thomas Cook and Siddhi Vinayak Enterprises, had challenged levy of service tax by AAI in the high courts. The high courts accordingly had stayed the recovery notices issued by the authority.
AAI had levied service tax on the licensees for airport services such as cargo and passenger handling and transit facilities provided by airlines and other companies. The authority had levied service tax on their billings for licence fee/royalty for duty-free shops at various airports.
AAI in its application on Monday said that service tax dues are payable by the licencees on these contracts which had either expired or are about to expire.
23/01/10 Financial Express

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HPCA wants more flights to Dharamsala during IPL

Dharamsala: The Himachal Pradesh Cricket Association will approach the civil aviation ministry to start at least two daily flights from Delhi to Dharamsala during April to meet the needs of Indian Premier League matches.
Two IPL matches have been alloted to the the city, HPCA president Anurag Thakur, son of chief minister Prem Kumar Dhumal and MP, told PTI.
About 25,000 spectators are expected to watch the two IPL matches to be held here, he added.
A team of IPL organisers visited Dharamsala yesterday to see the arrangements.
22/01/10 Press Trust of India

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Takeoff curbs applied to Airbus planes too; delays may worsen

New Delhi: The aviation regulator has tightened rules for Airbus planes taking off in low visibility, a move that could mean more flight disruptions in a season when a thick blanket of winter fog covers most cities in northern India.
Kingfisher Airlines Ltd, National Aviation Co. of India Ltd-run Air India and InterGlobe Aviation Pvt. Ltd-run IndiGo, which fly mainly Airbus A320 planes on domestic routes, have until now been allowed takeoffs even in foggy conditions, provided there is at least 125m visibility.
Flights of Jet Airways (India) Ltd, with a fleet made up mainly of Boeing aircraft, and SpiceJet Ltd, with an all-Boeing fleet, had to wait until the visibility went up to 150m before taking off.
The visibility standards were in line with the technical requirements of the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA). “There was a special dispensation for three airlines for two years. Now it is 150m for everybody,” said a DGCA official who asked not to be named.
The order was issued to the three carriers earlier this week.
The order may worsen the woes of air travellers already struggling with flight cancellations, delays and diversions in Delhi and other parts of northern India because of fog. On Wednesday, the Capital was covered by the densest fog in seven years.
21/01/10 Tarun Shukla/Live Mint

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Time wasted by pilots, poor upkeep of chopper caused YSR crash: Report

New Delhi: A six-minute effort by the pilot and the co-pilot to fix a snag midair, and torrential rain, proved to be among the main factors that led to the crash of Andhra Pradesh government chopper last September. Then CM Y S R Reddy and four others were killed in the accident. The report of a probe panel set up to examine the crash also indicted the state government for poor maintenance of the Bell-430 — the chopper's transmitter was non-functional, which led to a delay in locating the debris after the crash.
''The probable cause of the accident is (it) occurred due to loss of control resulting in uncontrolled descent in the terrain at a versy high rate due to entry into severe down draught,'' the report says.
The first factor in the chain of events leading up to the crash seems to be the chopper flying in torrential rain and entering thick clouds. The Bell-430 is not supposed to enter clouds and if there are clouds on the path, it must return or land.
When choppers fly in humid conditions, pilots often get false indicators.
As per rule book, in such a situation, pilots have to refer to the flight manual and see why the indicator is coming. ''This process should take 15 to 20 seconds. In the ill-fated Bell-430 this process took six minutes, right before crash,'' sources said.
21/01/10 Saurabh Sinha/Times of India

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Pilots’ error probably caused YSR copter crash

New Delhi: The helicopter crash that claimed the lives of the former Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister, Y.S.R. Reddy, and four others in September last was caused by the error of the pilots, who lost control over the chopper, according to the report of a committee of inquiry.
“The crew noticed a snag and was engrossed for vital six minutes, before the impact, in searching for the relevant checklist from the flight manual. This distracted their attention from the prevailing poor visibility, thus leading to the loss of situational awareness,” the report said. The crew flew in instrument flying condition, though the flight plan was cleared for Visual Flight Rules (VFR).
After more than four months of the probe, which included an in-depth analysis of data and consultations with experts, the four-member committee submitted the detailed report to the government on Wednesday.
“The accident occurred owing to the loss of control, resulting in an uncontrolled descent in the terrain at a very high rate due to entry into severe down draught,” the report said, pinpointing the “probable cause.”
During the investigation, the committee undertook a technical analysis at the crash site for crucial evidence, and at the APACL hangar in Hyderabad for a reconstruction/tear-down analysis of various components and systems. Technical inputs and analysis were coordinated with the Airports Authority of India (AAI), the Indian Air Force, the Indian Meteorological Department, the National Aeronautical Laboratories, Bangalore, and the Defence Metallurgical Research Laboratories, Hyderabad.
The Central Bureau of Investigation helped in certain analysis done at the Central Forensic Science Laboratories, Hyderabad. Indian Precision Lightning Network, Delhi, gave technical inputs on the electric charge scenario of the areas around the crash site.
21/01/10 The Hindu

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Government receives report on Andhra Pradesh helicopter crash

The Government has received the detailed report by the Committee set up to enquire into the helicopter crash in Andhra Pradesh which had taken place on 2 September, 2009.
The Central Government had appointed a four members Committee of Inquiry on 3 September, 2009 headed by Shri R.K. Tyagi, CMD, M/s. Pawan Hans Helicopters Limited to investigate the accident of the Bell 430 helicopter (BT-APG) of Andhra Pradesh Government which had occurred on 2 September, 2009. The Committee was mandated to enquire into the circumstances of this accident. The other members of Committee were Capt. Irshad Ahmed, Flight Operations Inspector (FOI), O/o Directorate General of Civil Aviation, Shri Sanjay Bramhane, Senior Air Safety Officer, O/o Directorate of Air Safety, DGCA Mumbai with Shri Maneesh Kumar, Dy. Director of Air Safety, DGCA as the Member Secretary of the Committee.
The Committee of Inquiry has submitted its report to the Government.
During the course of investigation, the investigation team undertook technical analysis at the crash site for crucial evidences and also at the Andhra Pradesh Aviation Corporation Limited (APACL) Hanger at Hyderabad for reconstruction/tear-down analysis of various helicopter components and systems.
Various technical inputs/analysis were coordinated with Airports Authority of India (AAI), Indian Air Force (IAF), Indian Meteorological Department (IMD), National Aeronautical Laboratories (NAL), Bangalore and Defence Metallurgical Research Laboratories (DMRL), Hyderabad. Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) provided help for certain analysis with Central Forensic Science Laboratories (CFSL), Hyderabad. India Precision Lightning Network, New Delhi provided technical inputs about the electric charge scenario of the areas around the site on the day of crash.
The help of various International Agencies like Transport Safety Board (TSB) Canada, National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), M/s. Bell Helicopters, M/s. Goodrich, M/s. Rolls Royce of USA were taken for Cockpit Voice Recorder (CVR) downloads, engine and Electronic Control Unit (ECU) analysis, etc.
The Committee interviewed and wherever necessary recorded the statement of various officials of Andhra Pradesh Government and also of APACL for various investigations/analysis.
The Probable cause of the accident is – accident occurred due to loss of control resulting in uncontrolled descent in the terrain at a very high rate of descent due to entry into severe down draught.

The other contributory factors were:
(a) The crew flew in Instrument Flying condition though flight plan was cleared for Visual Flight Rules (VFR).
(b) Crew noticed a snag and was engrossed for vital six minutes before the impact in searching for the relevant checklist from the Flight Manual. This distracted their attention from the prevailing poor visibility weather conditions thus leading into the loss of situational awareness.
The Report and its safety recommendations including on functioning of APACL and other regulatory issues are under consideration of the Government.
20/01/10 PRESS RELEASE/Press Information Bureau

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Fog blanket on flight, train schedule

New Delhi: Following the heavy fog, Air India rescheduled two international flights, PTI reported. New York-bound AI-101 and AI-121 to Frankfurt (both non-stop flights) were rescheduled. The Frankfurt flight has been rescheduled for 11 am Thursday, Air India officials were quoted by the agency.
For officials at the IGI Airport, it wasn’t very different from how the day began, with only a couple of flights operating in low visibility conditions. Runway visibility went down to 50 metres and stayed much below 150 metres from 2 am to 11 am. To add to the backlog, Delhi’s airspace was shut for normal operations for an hour from 11.15 am for Republic Day rehearsals.
Several aircraft had to wait in queue for over two hours before they could take off due to deteriorating visibility levels.
As many as 150 flights were delayed due to fog on Wednesday. One domestic and six international flights had to be diverted to other domestic destinations.
Six domestic departures, three domestic arrivals and an international departure had to be cancelled, while four other flights were rescheduled.
Earlier, fog delayed a Dubai-bound Emirates flight, EK513, by over 15 hours. The flight was scheduled for at 4.15 am but could not take off due to low visibility conditions. Passengers and crew were offered hotel accommodation.
21/01/10 Indian Express

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Paper-less flight tickets likely soon

Bar-coded boarding passes eliminate the need for a paper ticket, ease security clearance and world over, 83% of all boarding passes are 2-D bar coded.
No wonder then that International Air Transport Association (IATA) is pushing Indian airports and airlines to also fall in line and begin investing in this procedure.
Already, the new airports of Hyderabad and Bangalore are 100% compliant in issuing bar-coded boarding passes and among the airlines, Kingfisher is also fully compliant. Eric Leopold, project manager for BCBP project at IATA, pointed out that Jet Airways is working on it. Delhi and Mumbai international airports are also beginning to equip themselves with this facility.
The Bureau of Civil Aviation Security (BCAS) and the Airports Authority of India (AAI) — the two organisations who will decide on the security implications and implementation of this process at all airports — still appear lukewarm to the move. This despite an AAI project, which will equip 13 non-metro airports to issue such boarding passes. It’s a part of the AAI’s airport modernisation drive.
21/01/10 Sindhu Bhattacharya/Daily News & Analysis

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Pawan Hans pays Rs.8.92 crores dividend to the Government

Pawan Hans Helicopters Ltd.(PHHL), a Government of India Enterprise under the Ministry of Civil Aviation, has paid a dividend of Rs. 11.37 Crores for the Financial Year 2008-09 @ 10% of its paid up equity to its shareholders i.e. President of India/Ministry of Civil Aviation & ONGC. The paid up Capital of the Company is Rs.113.76 Crores with Government of India holding 78.5% and balance 21.5% being held by ONGC. The Company has been consistently paying dividend since 1992-93 and till date has paid Rs. 205.88 Crores.
Shri R.K. Tyagi, CMD, PHHL presented the dividend cheque of Rs. 8.92 Crores (Government of India share) to Shri Praful Patel, Minister for Civil Aviation, Shri M.M. Nambiar, Secretary, Ministry of Civil Aviation and other senior officers of the Ministry of Civil Aviation.
PHHL’s operating profit has increased from Rs.6.21 Crores (2007-08) to Rs.20.30 Crores (2008-09). In the current year the operating profit of the company till December 2009 is Rs. 28.00 Crores.
The Company has been able to secure good long term business with the institutional clients mainly in the Oil industry and Government sector which has resulted in improved utilization of helicopter fleet. The Company was able to achieve improved financial performance as compared to previous year on account of long term contracts, better charter rate structure with high revenue yield and increased utilization of helicopters through improved serviceability of fleet.
The Minister appreciated the good work being done by the Company and has assured the support of the Government to enable it to grow further.
20/01/10 PRESS RELEASE/Press Information Bureau

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Tweet a flight schedule, air fare

Delhi: Aviation giants are cashing in on the rage around social networking websites like Facebook and Twitter to keep in touch with their clientele. While some like Jet Airways have already registered their presence on these websites, others are following suit.
Launching the Jet group Facebook and Twitter, acting CEO, Jet Airways, Nikos Kardassis said that social media was fast gaining prominence in a wired world.
The communities provide information about on-the-go promotions, trivia, real-time help, maintenance alerts, best deals and news feeds.
Kingfisher Airlines has already launched such communities on Orkut, Facebook and Twitter. "While these communities on Orkut and Facebook were there for quite some time, we launched it on Twitter, recently," said Prakash Mirpuri, official spokesperson, Kingfisher Airlines.
A top Indigo Airline representative confirmed launching of such communities. "...We are also in the process of launching our communities on such websites very soon," the official said.
20/01/10 Surender Sharma/MiD DAY

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This chopper will turn 53 tomorrow

Mumbai: The oldest helicopter that is still flying high in the Indian skies turns 53 tomorrow. The Bell 47 was originally bought by the Indian Air Force in 1957, and was used as an air ambulance and for supplying ration.
In the 60s, the Shapoorji Pallonji group purchased it, and it was sold to an Indo-American aviation company in the 80s. Finally, H S Rao, managing director, Pushpaka Aviation, bought the chopper in 2000.
Rao told MiD DAY, "I bought the chopper in 2000 from Inda Amer Aviation which would have grounded the chopper, but I knew the power of Bell 47s from personal experience."
The Directorate General of Civil Aviation declared the chopper airworthy and it was fit to fly again.
Captain A Ranganathan, an aviation expert, said, "I cannot comment upon the average age of a chopper, but I have seen that airlines ordinarily do not use an aircraft for more than 15-20 years. Singapore Airlines replaces its aircraft every five years, so probably a chopper's age is much lesser.
20/01/10 MiD DAY

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Delhi fog may force IAF to cancel R-Day flypast

New Delhi: IAF plans to put up a grand flypast of 28 warplanes during this year's Republic Day parade but is keeping its fingers crossed as it fears that the notorious Delhi fog could play a spoilsport.
"Fog is a recurrent feature in this season. So, if the weather is bad, there are certain limitations clearly laid down. If it is below the minimum mast, obviously the flying won't happen," IAF's Vice Chief (Space) Air Vice Marshal M Matheswaran told reporters here today.
However, he said flight safety would not be compromised. "So, only if the weather permits, everything will go as planned. In different weather patterns, some formations will be watered down," Matheswaran said, to a specific query in this regard.
IAF officers said the Phalcon Airborne Early Warning and Control System (AWACS) built on an IL-76 platform, called the 'eye in the sky', would be participating in the flypast during Republic Day for the first time. The IAF would also bring in its Sukhoi, MiG-29, Jaguar and IL-78 tanker, AN-32 and Dornier transport aircraft to the flypast this year, besides four Advanced Light Helicopter Dhruvs of the Army Aviation Corps.
19/01/10 Times of India

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Boeing, Airbus fight over market share in India

Mumbai: With around 242 aircraft expected to be delivered to Indian carriers over the next five years between 2010 and 2014, Boeing and Airbus are locked in battle over market share.
According to Boeing India president Dinesh Keskar, the company is supposed to deliver an additional 100 aircraft to its Indian customers over the next five years. Talking to FE, Keskar said, “We have not had any cancellations from India and so far our orders are intact.” Boeing’s main customer is National Aviation Company of India, which alone accounts for 68 aircraft orders.
Airbus is slated to deliver 142 aircraft according to a company official. This would take its share to around 54% of the total 680 aircraft expected to be in operation. Airbus’ primary customer in India is Kingfisher Airlines.
Of the total 440 aircraft in use today, Airbus accounts for 223 or 51%, while close to 220 aircraft come from the Boeing stable. In 2005, Indian carriers were operating close to 200 aircraft and Keskar estimates that the country will need around 1000 aircraft, valued currently at close to $100 billion (Rs 470,000 crore), over the next 20 years.
Airbus delivered its first aircraft in 1976 to the erstwhile Indian Airlines, and with carriers like Kingfisher Airlines, Jet Airways and Air India, among its current crop of customers, the company estimates that the country will need around 992 aircraft by 2026.
19/01/10 Shaheen Mansuri/Financial Express

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Jet fuel to be kept out of GST net

New Delhi: Aviation turbine fuel (ATF) will be kept out of the Goods and Services Tax (GST) net even as the domestic airline industry is keen on its inclusion in the new tax system.
The Government is looking to introduce a dual GST system, which will be a milestone for theindirect tax reforms.
The Centre has now agreed with the States' proposal that ATF, crude, motor spirit and high speed diesel (HSD) be excluded from the proposed GST regime, the CBEC Member, Mr S. Dutt Majumder, said at an Amcham India event here on Monday.
This means that ATF will continue to be subjected to sales tax ranging from 4 to 30 percent even after the GST system is introduced.
Mitigation of cascading effect of taxation is one of the perceived benefits of GST to trade. However, with ATF's exclusion from GST, the cascading effect is unlikely to be mitigated. The input tax on ATF paid by the airlines will most likely be passed on to the passengers (without any set-off benefit), Mr Pratik Jain, Executive Director, Tax and Regulatory Services, KPMG, told Business Line. There are strong indications that commercial domestic air travel services will be subjected to GST.
18/01/10 Business Line

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DGCA reprieve on deadline to phase-out expat pilots

Mumbai: Domestic air-operators seem to have earned a reprieve with the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) understood to have extended the deadline for phasing out expat pilots by one year.
The aviation industry regulator had earlier fixed July 31, 2010, as the deadline for domestic airlines to phase out their foreign pilots.
"The DGCA has given us more time to phase out expat pilots. It has extended the deadline by one year," a top industry official told PTI here.
17/01/10 Press Trust of India

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Heli-hop above all traffic woes

Bangalore: According to the city’s two helicopter service companies — Deccan Charters and Global Vectra — their whirlybirds are regularly chartered by international corporate heads visiting their Indian plants; there is also inland demand for emergency medical transfers. And that demand is slowly increasing.
“We’re booked for 20 to 25 days a month,” says Sanjay Saigal, vice-president Deccan Charters. Saigal agrees that business is picking up, but says that consistency has not yet been achieved. “..Demand has seen a 20% rise, but that’s not enough to start a shuttle service,” says Saigal. Deccan currently operates three helicopters out of Bangalore.
Global Vectra may only have one chopper based in the city, but it is keeping its options open for more, according to the company’s deputy general manger, Arjun Chopra. “We get a lot of charter demands, but not enough for a regular shuttle service,” says Chopra. He believes that it is only a matter of time before Bangalore opts for an airborne solution to vexing connectivity issues.
The ITC Royal Gardenia Bangalore, which is the only hotel in India to have a helipad, is hoping it will be a big hit with corporate leaders.
R Madhu of SLS Tourist, a leading India tour company, says, “Heli-tourism could have picked up if the government had taken the initiative. It has not happened, but it will.”
Now, however, with the BBMP stating it may allow helicopters to land on residential and commercial buildings, an increasing number of factories, hospitals, hotels and high-end residential clusters are building helipads.
Captain GR Gopinath of Deccan Aviation, who pioneered low-cost air travel in India, believes that helicopters are a viable transport option.
Sudeep Chandran of Terra Firma, a leading land consultant, says, “Many transnational companies setting up shop in North Bangalore (Doddaballapur) are building helipads.”
16/01/10 PK Surendran/Daily News & Analysis

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Fog hits 19 flights in Delhi

New Delhi: Thick fog was back in the capital on Saturday morning after a day's respite. Though the condition improved eventually, the morning fog led to the disruption of flight and train schedules.
While 19 flights were delayed, around 24 trains to and from Delhi were also running late. The delayed flights include eight domestic and 11 international flights.
Seven arriving international flights that were delayed were from Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Istanbul, Beijing, Tehran and Singapore.
And the four departing international flights that were delayed include destinations like Istanbul, Dhaka and Adis Ababa.
16/01/10 Central Chronicle

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Airlines to decide soon on hike in airfares

New Delhi: As the state-run oil companies decided to hike the aviation turbine fuel (ATF) price by a 6.5 per cent, major Indian carriers on Friday said they will take a decision on raising the airfares in a couple of days.
Spokespersons of Kingfisher Airlines, Jet Airways and Air India said that it would be too early to comment on the issue.
They said the airlines would take a couple of days to decide on the issue.
The airlines, including low-cost carriers IndiGo and SpiceJet, have slashed the number of fare buckets in the past few months which has led to an overall increase in the general fare level.
After two months of price cuts, the oil companies today hiked ATF price by a steep 6.5 per cent in step with hardening international rates. Jet fuel price in Delhi would be increased by Rs. 2,519.83 per kilolitre to Rs. 41,216.43 per kl effective midnight Friday.
International crude prices have firmed up this month to $ 82—84 per barrel, leading to hike in jet fuel rates.
15/01/10 Press Trust of India/The Hindu

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ATF prices to go up by 6.5 % from midnight

New Delhi: After two months of price cuts, the state-run oil companies today hiked aviation turbine fuel (ATF) price by a steep 6.5 per cent in step with hardening international rates.
Jet fuel price in Delhi was increased by Rs 2519.83 per kilolitre to Rs 41216.43 per kl effective midnight Friday, an official of Indian Oil Corp, the nation's largest oil firm, said.
16/01/10 Press Trust of India

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Airlines demand lower taxes, core infra status

New Delhi: Cash-strapped domestic airlines have asked the government to declare the civil aviation sector as 'core infrastructure' and rationalise taxes and duties on jet fuel, equipment, services and other items.
In their pre-Budget demands presented to Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee, the airlines have strongly favoured declaring civil aviation as core infrastructure so that the sector could get tax and other benefits, airline sources said.
14/01/10 Press Trust of India

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GMV Awarded Contract by Raytheon for India's GAGAN Program

GMV, a private, multinational firm headquartered in Madrid, has been awarded a contract with Raytheon Company to develop a prototype algorithm for the detection of ionospheric depletions in the magnetic equatorial region that may be utilized in the user receiver data processing for the space-based augmentation system for the GAGAN program operated by the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO). This is GMV’s second contract with Raytheon Company. In 2007, GMV began a contract with Raytheon to provide maintenance and training support for Raytheon’s commercial ground systems.
GAGAN (Global Positioning Satellite-Aided Geosynchronous Augmented Navigation System) is a space-based augmentation system (SBAS) developed by the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) and the Airports Authority of India. "Gagan" is the transliteration of a Hindi word that means sky. GAGAN will provide satellite-based navigation for civil aviation across South and East Asia, giving India an accurate, flexible, and efficient air navigation system.
The program is in its final operational phase, incorporating critical navigation components.
Raytheon has deployed various elements of the system, both in this and in earlier phases of the program. It has signed a contract with ISRO for incorporating the necessary modifications in the system data processing, message generation, and user receiver processing to increase the availability of precision approach guidance to civil aircraft using SBAS in the equatorial region.
14/01/10 GPS World

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Airlines crack whip on 'high' pilots, crew

New Delhi: Airlines have started taking a cue from the Directorate General of Civil Aviation’s (DGCA) tough line on drunken flying and begun taking strict action like sacking the ‘high’ fliers.
In the past four months, DGCA’s random checks have led to 15 airline employees — six pilots and nine cabin crew members — being found drunk while reporting for work. Kingfisher has terminated the service of two pilots who failed the breathanalyser tests on October 4 and 21, 2009. On November 1, an airhostess also failed this test and she too was sacked, according to highly placed DGCA sources. The airline did not comment on this issue.
A Jet Airways’ cabin crew staffer was caught drunk for the second time on October 14, 2009, and he had to leave the company by month-end.
According to DGCA figures from last Sept to Jan 5, apart from Kingfisher’s two pilots, four others — one each of Jet, Air India, AI express and Go Air — failed the alcohol tests. “Jet grounded the co-pilot for three months. AI and AI Express cleared their pilots after some action. Go Air grounded its flier for two months,” said the official.
14/01/10 Saurabh Sinha/Times of India

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Domestic airlines carry 33% more passengers in Dec

New Delhi: December proved to be the best month for the domestic aviation industry that flew 44.87 lakh passengers, an increase of 33 per cent from 33.73 lakh flown in December 2008, the latest data released by the Director-General of Civil Aviation show. Previously, the maximum number of passengers flown in a month was 40.29 lakh in October 2009.
The data show that only two airlines — the Chennai-based Paramount Airways and Kingfisher Airlines — reported a decline in the number of passengers flown in the first quarter of 2009 and the last quarter. While Kingfisher flew almost 100,000 fewer passengers in the last quarter than the 26.76 lakh passengers flown in the first quarter, Paramount carried about 18,000 fewer passengers in the fourth quarter having flown 1.83 lakh passengers against 2.01 lakh carried in the first quarter.
In absolute number terms, Jet Airways flew 6.44 lakh more passengers during the fourth quarter compared with the first quarter while Air India carried 6.24 lakh more passengers during the period. December, however, was a good month for the industry with ticket prices soaring on increased demand.
13/01/10 Business Line

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Domestic air traffic grows 7.8% in 2009

Mumbai/New Delhi: There are signs of revival in the aviation sector with carriers finally emerging from two years of turbulence, as an improving economic scenario and relaxed corporate travel norms led to a 7.8% growth in air traffic in the calendar year 2009 over the previous year.
According to statistics compiled by the Directorate General of Civil Aviation, the number of passengers carried by domestic airlines in 2009 totalled 445.13 lakh, against 412.71 lakh in 2008.This is in sharp contrast to the situation in 2008 when passenger traffic dipped, operating costs shot up due to higher oil prices and fares slipped to very low levels on sagging demand and competition.
In terms of market share, Jet Airways and JetLite have the largest chunk of the market, managing over one-fourth of the passenger traffic in 2009. While Jet and JetLite together accounted for 25.4% of the market last year, they were closely followed by Kingfisher with 23.9%; Air India got 17.5%, while no-frills carrier IndiGo shared 13.9% and SpiceJet 12.4%.
Analysts said the growth in the aviation sector is directly linked with the growth of gross domestic product, which has rebounded to pre-slowdown phase of nearly 8%.
14/01/10 Economic Times

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JetLite tops flight cancellation list, GoAir lowest

Mumbai: Low-cost airline JetLite topped the flight cancellation list in December with 3.2 per cent, while budget airline GoAir had the lowest cancellation rate at 0.5 per cent in the same month, according to DGCA estimates.
Jetlite was followed by the all-business class Paramount Airways at three per cent while the overall industry average of the domestic airlines was at 1.8 per cent during December 2009.
As per the Directorate General of Civil Aviation, domestic air operators cancelled over 40 per cent cent of their flights for commercial reasons - non availability of aircraft or crew.
Technical grounds accounted for 36 per cent cancellations while weather was responsible for 23.9 per cent cancellations during the month, it added.
Another private carrier Kingfisher, which returned 19 aircraft in a span of 10 months last year and subsequently reduced the capacity to a significant extent, cancelled 2.1 per cent of its total flights during the month last year.
While Jet Airways' flight cancellations rate was at 2.1 per cent, national air-carrier Air India cancelled 1.7 per cent of its total flights during the period.
SpiceJet and IndiGo were the two other airlines that posted minimum cancellation rate at 0. 6 per cent each.
13/01/10 Press Trust of India/Business Standard

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Chronicle of a dream

Bangalore: Sitting on the sunny poolside deck of Captain GR Gopinath’s bungalow in the heart of the city — lovingly refurbished after he bought it in a hopelessly run down condition from the previous owners — it is a little tough to imagine him once living for months in a tent in the middle of his farm or using a bullock cart to ferry his would-be bride and her family to inspect his living arrangements.
That’s exactly the reason why Captain Gopinath equates his story with that of a New India — an India where a poor school teacher’s son from a village in Karnataka can launch one of the most capital-intensive businesses and, through it, change everything about a sector once thought of as elite and exclusive.
While Gopinath’s textbook rags-to-riches story has often been quoted as an example of what a compulsive Indian entrepreneur with more ideas than he knows what to do with can achieve, his book 'Simply Fly: A Deccan Odyssey' helps the reader fill in the outlines with colour.
“Too many people suggested that I write this book for me to think about it seriously,” says Gopinath while clarifying that while hewouldn’t strictly call the book an autobiography, it isn’t just the story of his launching Air Deccan, as seems to be the general assumption. “Nor is it a how-to book on entrepreneurial success,” he says. Instead, the book provides detailed glimpses into Gopinath’s early life, his years in the army, the decade he spent as a farmer and his subsequent foray into aviation. There are few literary flourishes, yet it is obvious that when Gopinath gets down to telling a story, he tells a cracking good one with characteristic single-mindedness.
14/01/10 Shrabonti Bagchi/Daily News & Analysis

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100 new helipads proposed for India's northeast

New Delhi: The paramilitary Assam Rifles proposes to construct over 100 helipads in India's northeastern states for quick mobilization of its troopers along the 1,600-km Myanmar border even as it plans to raise 26 battalions to add to the existing 46.
"We have proposed the construction of over 100 helipads to the ministry of home affairs. These helipads would be constructed all over the northeastern states and help in quick mobilisation of troopers, dealing with medical emergencies and supplying rations," the Assam Rifles chief, Lt. General KS Yadava, said.
"We hope this proposal would be cleared by year-end. These helipads would be built along the India-Myanmar border because the terrain is very vast and difficult. It takes days to cover even a few kilometers. It would be to largely support the 26 additional battalions which we will be raising in the next 10 years for deployment along the 1,600- km India-Myanmar border," Yadava added.
He said three to four battalions would be raised every year. Infrastructure like roads will also be developed.
Noting that the helipads would be independent of those operated in the northeast by the Indian Army and the Indian Air Force, Yadava discounted suggestions that their construction was linked to countering the perceived threat from China.
13/01/10 IANS/Times of India

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Airlines may turn in profits on improved passenger volumes

Mumbai/New Delhi: After several quarters of flying through turbulent weather, India’s listed airline companies are expected to report profits for the quarter ended December as more passengers took to the skies.
Four analysts and consultants interviewed by Mint expected low-fare carrier SpiceJet Ltd to post a quarterly net profit of at least Rs80 crore and Jet Airways (India) Ltd to post a small profit of at least Rs10 crore. Kingfisher Airlines Ltd, the third listed carrier, is likely to make an operating profit in the December quarter.
Airline revenues have been buoyed by an increase in passenger volumes as the Indian economy rebounded from the slowdown of early 2009 and lower fuel prices allowed carriers to roll back some of the price hikes that scared off fliers in 2008.
The Directorate General of Civil Aviation, India’s airline regulator, said on Wednesday that the country’s domestic airline passenger market expanded 7.5% in 2009 compared with 2008, a year when passenger numbers slumped. Nearly 3.07 million additional passengers took to air travel in 2009, taking the total number of passengers carried to 43.84 million—up from 40.77 million in 2008 and 42.85 million in 2007.
13/01/10 P.R. Sanjai and Tarun Shukla/Live Mint

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Domestic passengers carried by Indian Scheduled Airlines in 2009

The total passengers flown by the domestic carriers in 2009 were 438.46 lakhs. The break-up is as follows:
Air India (Domestic) – 76.82 lakhs, Jet Airways –78.46 lakhs, Jet Lite – 32.77 lakhs, Kingfisher – 104.83 lakhs, Spice Jet – 54.46 lakhs, Paramount – 8.30 lakhs, Go Air – 20.61 lakhs, IndiGo – 61.03 lakhs.
The percentage share of the carriers in 2009 was:
Air India (Domestic) 17.5, Jet Airways – 17.9%, Jet Lite – 7.5%, Kingfisher – 23.9%, Spice Jet – 12.4%, Paramount – 1.9%, Go Air – 4.7% and IndiGo – 13.9%.
The total domestic passengers carried by the Scheduled Airlines of India in the month of December, 2009 were 44.87 lakhs. The break-up is as follows:
Air India (Domestic) – 8.20 lakhs, Jet Airways –8.52 lakhs, Jet Lite – 3.21 lakhs, Kingfisher – 9.35 lakhs, Spice Jet – 5.79 lakhs, Paramount – 0.64 lakhs, Go Air – 2.32 lakhs, IndiGo – 6.84 lakhs.
The percentage share of the carriers in the month of December, 2009 was:
Air India (Domestic) – 18.3%, Jet Airways – 19.0%, Jet Lite – 7.2%, Kingfisher – 20.8%, Spice Jet – 12.9%, Paramount – 1.4%, Go Air – 5.2 % and IndiGo – 15.2%.
The seat factors of the domestic airlines in the December 2009 were:
Air India (Domestic) – 79.7%, Jet Airways – 78.2%, JetLite – 81.6%, Kingfisher Airlines – 80.2%, Spice Jet – 88.0%, Paramount Airways – 88.7%, Go Air – 86.1% and IndiGo – 90.0%.
The break-up of the total domestic passengers carried by the Scheduled Airlines of India in the fourth quarter of 2009 (October 2009 to December 2009) is as follows:
Air India (Domestic) – 22.94 lakhs, Jet Airways –23.98 lakhs, Jet Lite – 9.26 lakhs, Kingfisher – 25.79 lakhs, Spice Jet – 15.47 lakhs, Paramount – 1.83 lakhs, Go Air – 6.53 lakhs, IndiGo – 17.74 lakhs.
It may be recalled that the total domestic passengers carried by the Scheduled Airlines of India in the first quarter of 2009 (January 2009 to March 2009) was 98.22 lakhs. The break-up is as follows:
Air India (Domestic) – 16.70 lakhs, Jet Airways –17.54 lakhs, Jet Lite – 7.22 lakhs, Kingfisher – 26.67 lakhs, Spice Jet – 11.85 lakhs, Paramount – 2.01 lakhs, Go Air – 2.59 lakhs, IndiGo – 13.23 lakhs.
Domestic passengers carried by the Scheduled Airlines of India in the second quarter of 2009 (April 2009 to June 2009) was 109.38 lakhs. The break-up is as follows:
Air India (Domestic) – 19.18 lakhs, Jet Airways –17.80 lakhs, Jet Lite – 8.11 lakhs, Kingfisher – 27.72 lakhs, Spice Jet – 13.57 lakhs, Paramount – 2.30 lakhs, Go Air – 5.34 lakhs, IndiGo – 14.98 lakhs.
The total domestic passengers carried by the Scheduled Airlines of India in the third quarter of 2009 (July 2009 to September 2009) was 107.32 lakhs. The break-up is as follows:
Air India (Domestic) – 18.00 lakhs, Jet Airways –19.14 lakhs, Jet Lite – 8.18 lakhs, Kingfisher – 24.65 lakhs, Spice Jet – 13.57 lakhs, Paramount – 2.16 lakhs, Go Air – 6.15 lakhs, IndiGo – 15.08 lakhs.
13/01/10 PRESS RELEASE/Press Information Bureau

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Blacklist habitual offenders: Crew

Mumbai: The recent spate of alleged molestation cases on flights — five in the last one week alone — underlines the growing need for more stringent laws that will deter ‘‘erring’’ male travellers, say all the female cabin crew members that TOI spoke to.
‘‘It’s not that this kind of sexual harassment and misbehaviour is new; it is an occupational hazard for most female crew,’’ says a flight attendant with a private carrier. What’s changed is that not only are instances of misbehaviour on the rise, but more air hostesses are willing to report them.
‘‘You have to deal with people deliberately jutting their elbows out, or brushing their hands against you. There was a time when the crew hardly ever discussed them, but that attitude is changing, with more of us taking a stand against harassment,’’ she added.
In a majority of cases that have been reported, the accused have been let off on bail after a mild rap on the knuckles. ‘‘Why can’t the airline blacklist a habitual molester?’’ asked a crew member.
12/01/10 Chinmayi Shalya/Times of India

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Airlines to rein in unruly flyers

Mumbai: In response to the sudden and rather alarming rise in the cases of passenger misbehaviour reported by female cabin crew members, airlines said they were already in talks with Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) about enforcing stricter norms to deter unruly behaviour.
Besides inconveniencing cabin crew, passenger misbehaviour has been one of the major reasons for emergency landings costing a carrier lakhs of rupees. For instance, the diversion of an AI Dubai-Calicut flight to Mumbai cost the airline around Rs 20 lakh.
‘‘Airlines are in touch with cabin safety inspectors to chalk out rules and ways to control such behaviour on flights,’’ said a senior member of a private carrier. ‘‘Though there are crime laws in place, we are trying to come up with something that will deter passengers from harassing the crew,’’ he added.
However, as of now, few airlines are willing to follow the current air-rage rules framed by International Air Travel Association (IATA) that can be implemented globally. That is because these regulations are not abiding and are left to the discretion of the carrier.
‘‘If we are the only carrier to regularly blacklist offenders, it will not reflect well in the minds of our customers. All airlines should implement these rules,’’ said a senior airline official on condition of anonymity.
Barring a passenger with an unruly behaviour record, or not allowing a drunk traveller to board a flight are some of the measures airlines said they were willing to take, provided they are made compulsory.
12/01/10 Chinmayi Shalya/Times of India

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Airlines fly to smaller cities for growth in passenger traffic

New Delhi: India’s airlines are charting new routes to connect neglected, smaller cities that have some tourist or business potential, as the economy brightens and passenger numbers rise.
Airlines saw a spurt in passenger traffic, growing by 5.45% to 39.96 million between January and November, according to the regulator Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA). The figure for December is not yet available. The number had contracted as much as 4.84% to 42.85 million in 2008.
Kingfisher Airlines Ltd and regional airline Jagson Airlines Ltd are among those planning to harness the potential of smaller airports.
“The bigger airlines have a focus on category I (metro) routes by default, but category II routes like smaller capital cities make a lot of sense,” said Jagson CEO Koustav M. Dhar.
Jagson plans to take to the skies from February with a 88-seater aircraft and subsequently increase its fleet to four by the end of the year. It will connect Srinagar to Leh with a daily flight starting April.
So far, only Air India has a weekly flight between the two cities, an Airports Authority of India (AAI) official at Leh airport said over the phone.The AAI official said additional flights will help, but there was a limited potential. Jagson will also connect New Delhi to Shimla and Dharamshala, and operate flights to Ranchi and Patna in summer on alternate days.
Kingfisher Airlines has started flights between Chennai and the industrial town of Salem in Tamil Nadu, and Jharkhand’s capital Ranchi and Chhattisgarh’s capital Raipur recently. It has also received permission to start services to Uttarakhand’s Pantnagar from New Delhi. Also on the cards are flights to the hosiery and garments hub of Ludhiana in Punjab from New Delhi.
11/01/10 Tarun Shukla/Live Mint

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Friendly skies

Rising passenger numbers, healthy load factors and a tight control on costs could help the aviation sector limp back to profits after a gap of over two years. Little wonder, stocks of aviation companies have done far better than the broader markets in the recent past.
While 2008-09 was a disaster for the sector which recorded a year-on-year de-acceleration for the first time since 2002 due to the global downturn, passenger volumes since the start of 2009 have been on the upswing. DGCA data shows that passenger volumes went up 5.5 per cent between the January to November 2009 period over the same period in 2008. A large part of this increase has come during the August to November 2009 period when passenger volumes numbers have increased between 25-30 per cent year-on-year. Analysts expect the trend of double-digit growth in passenger volumes to sustain on the back of improving economic outlook.
With demand creeping back, airlines have, since July, been adding capacity, albeit in a gradual manner. Strong demand since then has meant better capacity utilisation with loads hovering at the 75 per cent range, considerably better than the 70 per cent loads during the September 2009 quarter. This has given airlines better pricing power, with some airlines mulling fare hikes on select routes from the current month.
Fuel, which makes for 40 per cent of the operational cost, however, could play spoilsport. ATF prices have risen by 60 per cent to Rs 41 a litre since its lows in May 2009. Despite the rise, it is still 10 per cent below year ago figures. With strong demand and higher ticket prices, this might not be an issue yet for the players, unless crude oil prices gain momentum for current levels of $82-83 a barrel.
12/01/10 Vishal Chhabria & Ram Prasad Sahu/Busuness Standard

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Surge in passenger numbers to help airlines cut losses

New Delhi: Airlines in the country are expected to cut down their losses in the third quarter of this financial year, thanks to a consistent increase in passenger numbers and the consequent surge in yields.
The passenger numbers in the third quarter were up by over 25 per cent compared to the same quarter last year. The passenger numbers rose by 26 per cent in October, 30 per cent in November and are set to rise by around 30 per cent in December, according to industry estimates.
“With the rise in passenger numbers, our bad times seem to be getting over. As yields are directly proportional to passenger numbers, our yields are up by 25 per cent and we are set to see good quarterly figures,” said Paramount Airways Managing Director M Thiagarajan.
The airlines have also been successful in bringing down their costs by 12 per cent.
The aviation turbine fuel price, which constitutes 40 per cent of an airline’s operational cost, is also less than it was in the same quarter last year.
The three listed airlines in India made an accumulated loss of Rs 860 crore in the third quarter of the last financial year. Kingfisher Airlines losses were at Rs 626 crore, Jet was at Rs 214 crore and SpiceJet incurred a loss of Rs 17.96 crore. Annual losses of these airlines in 2008-09 were at Rs 3,000 crore.
11/01/10 Mihir Mishra/Business Standard

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Mahindra plans 'Nano' move into light aircraft

Mumbai: India's Mahindra group is seeking to do for the country's aviation manufacturing industry what rival Tata conglomerate is doing for the car market with its Nano people's car, by developing a new line of light civilian passenger aircraft.
Mahindra, which last month acquired two Australian aviation companies - Gippsland Aeronautics and Aerostaff Australia - is planning to begin manufacturing two to 18-seater light aircraft for India that will be cheaper to buy and run than foreign brands and will be adapted for the country's tough conditions.
"Our dream is to be the Embraer of India," Hemant Luthra, president of Mahindra Systech Sector engineering arm, said in an interview. Any move into mass marketing of light civilian aircraft would mark a first for India, whose aviation industry still largely relies on imported aircraft.
Mr Luthra said Mahindra executives got the idea to work on a light aircraft for India after a review of the country's airport facilities. While India has 50-60 airports in urban and metropolitan areas, it has 300-350 landing strips that tend to be nearer remote tourist spots and outlying industrial areas, such as factories, refineries, ports, mines and power plants.
Mahindra plans to invest Rs1.75bn over five years to increase its aerospace arm's output from Gippsland Aviation's sales history of 230 aircraft sold in 30 countries to 475 units across 50 countries.
It will sell Gippsland Aeronautics'eight-seater "Airvan" as well as revive an earlier model, the 18-seater GA-24 turboprop. The company decided to stick to the two to 20-seater propeller aircraft market, which has annual sales of 4,000 units worth a total of $5bn and is growing 15 per cent a year.
11/01/10 Joe Leahy/Financial Times, UK

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Helicopter professionals seek policy for chopper industry

New Delhi: In a submission before the Civil Aviation Ministry, the Rotary Wing Society of India (RWSI) has said there was an urgent need to formulate an Integrated National Aeronautical Policy that would take into account the short and long-term needs of the helicopter industry.
The RWSI said the areas of synergies should also include common facilities for skill development of pilots, Aircraft Maintenance Engineers and product support.
Noting that the industry was facing problems relating to operation and maintenance of helicopters, it said these were not only confined to the regulatory authority or the Directorate General of Civil Aviation but have to be resolved by several departments under the Ministry.
Helicopter operations are set to expand and play a key role in the near future in providing emergency medical services, policing and emergency restoration projects like fixing faults on high power transmission lines. It can also play a role in news gathering and aerial surveillance.
In the paper, the RWSI said there was an urgent need to recognise the potentials of helicopters and framing of rules depending on the various roles these would play.
On financial and fiscal issues, the helicopter professionals' body wanted rationalisation of tax on aviation turbine fuel used by choppers and bringing sales tax rates down to four per cent. It suggested abolition of octroi duty on import of helicopters and spares. The government has already removed customs duty on helicopters and their spares to give impetus to the industry.
10/01/10 PTI/Economic Times

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AAI not happy with carriers deploying smaller aircraft

New Delhi: Even as full-service carriers such as Jet and Kingfisher have started deploying smaller aircraft or ATRs to cut costs, the move has not gone down well with the country’s largest airport operator Airports Authority of India (AAI).
The smaller aircraft, falling in a certain weight category, are charged a concessional rate of up to 60 per cent, for route navigation facilites, terminal navigation and landing charges by airport operators. The airport operator recently raised this issue with the civil aviation ministry and asked it to review the policy for rebate for smaller aircraft.
A senior airline executive told The Indian Express that airlines may not necessarily be shifting capacity to ATRs, but the connectivity between the metros and mini-metros is improving, resulting in increased number of ATR landings and take-offs.
Not only do the airlines benefit from using ATRs in terms of exemption from paying landing and parking charges, but they also save on fuel costs. As a special concession, a fixed 4 per cent sales tax is charged on aviation fuel for ATR operations.
11/01/10 Smita Aggarwal/Indian Express

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RIL to file criminal complaint against Telugu TV channel

Hyderabad: Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL) said on Friday it will lodge a criminal complaint against TV5, a Telugu language television channel that on Thursday evening aired a news story indicating that the company could have been behind the death of the then chief minister Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy (YSR) in a helicopter crash.
The channel said it based its sabotage story on a 3 September report by a Russian online bi-weekly tabloid, The Exiled.
Mark Ames, the author of the tabloid story, had said in the article he was speculating on a hypothesis that RIL could be behind Reddy’s death as the leader had demanded a share of the earnings for Andhra Pradesh from the company’s natural gas fields off the Krishna-Godavari (KG) basin.
Mukesh Ambani-led RIL, India’s largest company by market value, plans to produce 80 million cu. m of gas from the country’s largest field, KG-D6, this year.
In December, RIL had found more natural gas in the KG basin. Soon after TV5 aired the story, Reliance outlets across Andhra Pradesh were attacked by mobs.
TV5 is promoted by B. Rajagopal Naidu, a businessman from Chittoor. Sakshi TV, owned by Rajasekhara Reddy’s son and Kadapa legislator Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy, and another channel NTV, owned by real estate businessman Narendra Chowdary, too, aired the sabotage theory soon after.
09/01/10 C.R. Sukumar/Live Mint

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Editors Guild concerned over sensational report on death of former chief minister

New Delhi: The Editors Guild of India Friday expressed concern over some news channels' reports about the circumstances leading to the death of a former chief minister, which has led to attacks on the stores of Reliance group owned by the Ambani brothers, reported Indo-Asian News Service.
The news reports suggested that former Andhra Pradesh chief minister Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy, who died in a chopper crash on Sept. 2 last year, could be killed in a plot by the Ambani brothers, two of the richest men in the world.
Andhra Pradesh police have registered cases against owners of the Telugu TV channel TV 5 for airing a "baseless and malicious" report about an alleged conspiracy behind Reddy's death, which sparked violence in Andhra Pradesh and attacks on Reliance stores, said the report.
The TV 5 story was based on a report on a Russian website that alleged the Ambani brothers were behind the helicopter crash.
08/01/10 Xinhua

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Trouble in the Air

New Delhi: If one were a night passenger on any airline flying out of New Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International (IGI) Airport in the past week, chances are one would have spent many a nail-biting moment waiting endlessly to board the aircraft.
Thick fog – formed when the ground cools rapidly resulting in condensation, caused primarily by temperatures plummeting to record new lows – has been playing havoc with flight schedules at IGI Airport since the end of December last year.
In the first three days of the New Year, chaos reigned at IGI airport as over 70 domestic flights were delayed by several hours, six cancelled and 17 international services diverted to other cities. No flight could take off or land for eight hours on Jan. 2 as runway visibility fell to 100 metres and general visibility to less than 50 m (optimal is 600 m).
A glitch in cables connected to the Instrument Landing System (ILS), which measures and provides real-time runway visibility data to the Air Traffic Control tower, compounded matters further. This forced airport officials to shut operations for hours, throwing air schedules off kilter.
Last year over 200 flights got cancelled while about 1,000 were delayed at IGI airport for hours due to heavy fog, which threw flight operations into a tailspin from mid-December onwards.
Air passengers flying out of New Delhi suffer each winter due to inclement weather, surely not a matter of pride for a country feted as an "emerging superpower". The IGI has invested millions in upgrading its infrastructure and shelled out a whopping 100 crore rupees (21.877 million dollars) to install the latest ILS alone at the main and new runways for flights to operate glitch- free.
Collectively, airlines, too, have trained 1,323 pilots to use CAT-111 (the most sophisticated ILS that enables aircraft to land in very foggy conditions) at a cumulative cost of 200 crore rupees (43.75 million dollars). Of the 289 aircraft being used for domestic flights, 206 have also been made ILS- compliant.
08/01/10 Neeta Lal/IPS

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Amadeus launches Amadeus Ticket Changer

Mumbai: Amadeus has announced the launch of the Amadeus Ticket Changer. It is for the first time that a solution like this has been launched in India by any GDS. The solution has been designed to handle automation of the calculations necessary to reissue a ticket, and to store the results in the correct ticketing formats.
The Amadeus Ticket Changer is a multi-carrier and highly international solution that gives customers flexibility and reactivity to all their itinerary change needs. It allows all kinds of changes, including date, flight and routing, and processes a vast range of tickets, giving the end-consumer unprecedented control over their itineraries. Tickets for several different passengers can all be changed at the same time in one transaction and with the multi re-issue function an unlimited number of successive changes can be made to the ticket before departure.
With this new solution - Amadeus Ticket Changer, travel agents will no longer have to invest vast sums in the training and development of highly skilled staff, to make sure that they understand and remember each airline's cancellation and change policy. Additionally, with this new solution, agents can reduce the risk of mistakes and non-collection. The Amadeus Ticket Changer caters to all their requirements by incorporating the airline policies into one solution. This solution also enables the re-issuance of tickets, reporting and results in the reduction of debit memos.
08/01/10 TravelBizMonitor

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State gives nod for setting heliports at Nariman point and Nerul

Mumbai: The Mumbai skies will reverberate with the sounds of choppers ferrying passengers across the city by 2013. The state government has given clearance to two spots — one in the sea off Nariman Point and the other at Nerul in Navi Mumbai — for as many heliports. The work for the ports is likely to begin in May next year.
A feasibility study by the Mumbai Metropolitan Regional Development Authority (MMRDA) for the urban development department (UDD) had come up with six spots which were to be tested for a proposed heliport.
“The government finalised two spots,” said UDD-1 principal secretary TC Benjamin. “The spot in the sea off Nariman Point will be on a platform. This will have a capacity of bearing four helicopters, besides the terminal, ticketing points etc. The other spot will be at Sector 30 in Nerul.” The tendering process for both the heliports will begin in April.
The consultant appointed by MMRDA had suggested a few other spots like the Bandra reclamation casting yard area of the Bandra-Worli Sea Link, Backbay reclamation, Cuffe Parade and Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport at Sahar.
08/01/10 Ninad Siddhaye/Daily News & Analysis

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Mahindra intends to add bigger wings to aviation biz

New Delhi: Mahindra & Mahindra (M&M), the automobile manufacturer which has recently also entered the aviation sector, has ideas of replicating the global success of Brazilian aircraft maker Embraer.
The company acquired a stake of more than two-thirds in two Australian aerospace companies last month, to expand its aircraft and aerospace component manufacturing business.
Speaking on the sidelines of a truck launch made by M&M at the Delhi Auto Expo, vice-chairman and managing director Anand Mahindra said: “We have our feet firmly planted on the ground, but we have our dreams and they are not limited. There have been instances abroad, like Embraer, who have made it big in the aviation space.”
Anand Mahindra “I don’t see a reason why any company from India cannot do what Embraer did,” Mahindra added.
Embraer is one of the largest aircraft manufacturers in the world, based in Brazil, which services the commercial, defence and executive aviation space.
M&M is looking at establishing itself as a premier aircraft manufacturer, as well as a supplier of high-precision aircraft components. It has formed a wholly-owned unit named Mahindra Aerospace for the purpose. The company has already built and delivered executive private aircraft, which can seat five people in comfort, to Jordan-based Seabird Aviation. Post the acquisition of the two recently acquired companies, M&M hopes to build 20-seater executive jets, with an aim of selling 25-30 such aircraft every month.
M&M executives say they hope to sell about 475 aircraft globally in the next five years.
07/01/10 Swaraj Baggonkar/Business Standard

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Airlines lose Rs 25-30cr to fog

The New Year began on a foggy note for the Indian aviation sector. The fog that started on Saturday engulfed many airports like Delhi, Jaipur, and Lucknow and set back the aviation industry by a whopping Rs 25-30 crore.
According to data from various airlines, nearly 100 flights were delayed across the country. About 30 flights were cancelled between January 2 and January 4. Another 20 flights had to be rescheduled.
Experts say airlines lost close to Rs 30 crore in operational costs alone and this is just the provisional estimate. Additional losses have occurred on account of excess fuel consumption due to diversion and flights hovering over airports, holding aircrafts over and the deployment of extra air staff reserves.
05/01/10 Mehak Kasbekar and Isha Dalal/CNBC-TV18/Moneycontrol.com

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Policy on cards to 'tame' unruly flyers

Mumbai: Hospitality and handing of emergencies apart, for airlines in India, it is about time to have a well-structured training program for flight attendants that deals with unruly passenger behaviour.
"We had submitted a petition to the civil aviation minister a few years back to formulate a policy on the management of unruly passengers, both within the aircraft as well as at the airport," said general secretary of Aviation Industry Employees Guild (AIEG) George Abraham.
The recommendation covered measures adopted by foreign airlines like keeping restraining equipment onboard, handcuffing the passenger to the seat, regulating the number of drinks served, blacklisting passengers who are known to be violet, denying boarding pass to inebriated passenger and also familiarising and sensitising cabin crew and ground staff to handle unruly passengers, Abraham said.
Currently, in India, response to an unruly flyer is arbitrary and can depend on the commander and flight attendant concerned.
05/01/10 Manju V/Times of India

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Corporate air travel bookings rise again

Mumbai: As global economy improves, corporate business air travel too has followed suit with the industry seeing a sharp rise in the past few weeks. Travel agents and travel portal executives say that corporate bulk bookings have resumed, reflecting a recovery pattern in the corporate travel segment. Corporate sector air travel, which typically accounts for nearly half of the airlines’ capacity consumption, had shrunk sharply due to cost cutting last year.
Naveen Gulrajani, Vice-President- Sales, Cleartrip said, “We have seen a 40 per cent increase in bulk air tickets bookings from various corporate clients, including Blue Star, since last eight weeks. This indicates a clear revival for air travel by corporates. The Mumbai-Delhi and Bengaluru-Delhi sectors have witnessed a surge in corporate air bookings apart from the Delhi-Kolkata and Delhi-Hyderabad routes.”
According to a report in Economic Times, during recession, corporates embarked on a cost-cutting drive and business travel was the first to be struck off the list. This hit airline ticket bookings and travel agents. Ashwini Kakkar, Executive Vice Chairman, Mercury Travels said, “The recovery has seen more travellers and is expected to grow further in the coming months. Corporates are booking tickets not only in the Business Class, but in other categories as well.”
Travel agents say apart from the leisure sector, business travel is back on track as corporates have started hiring people and stalled expansion plans have been revived.
04/01/10 TravelBizMonitor

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