Flights resume, but sky's still not clear for fliers

Mumbai: Airlines can finally breathe with the European airspace opening up after an asphyxiating six days brought on by volcanic ash from Iceland, but passengers may have to endure delays for at least another week, with the backlog throwing flight schedules into disarray.
Indian and European airlines said they would resume flights to the West with additional and bigger aircraft, soon after the European air navigation safety authority announced opening up of its airspace on Tuesday. However, they will not be able to accommodate new passengers as most of the cancelled flights were up to 90% booked, said an Air India spokesperson. The carrier has a backlog of at least 10,000 passengers.
On an average, 13 international flights take off everyday from India carrying 3,500 passengers.
Air-India plans to resume flights on European and Canadian routes from April 22 by deploying a jumbo jet, the Boeing 747-400, which can carry more passengers on than the Boeing 777-300 ER it currently runs on the routes.
The airline is adding almost 423 seats on these sectors. Private carrier Jet Airways is also likely to run an additional flight to London with over 300 extra seats on the route.
Kingfisher Airlines, which has not operated a single flight for the past six days to London, will start operations from Thursday. The airline has a backlog of about 7,000 passengers.
22/04/10 Manisha Singhal/Economic Times

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Categories: Foreign Apr 2010, Indian Aviation- In General Apr 2010