Despite healthy patronage, lone Salem flight cancelled

Salem: The cancellation of the lone ATR flight from Kingfisher Airlines in the Chennai-Salem-Chennai sector has put regular air passengers from Salem and the adjoining districts of Namakkal and Dharmapuri in a quandary.
After a near two-decade struggle to make the airport active, the fliers from Salem and its neighbourhood, had the opportunity of getting connected to Chennai by a flight despite very `uncomfortable timings.' The flight would arrive at Salem airport at about 3.30 pm and leave for Chennai by 4.30 pm. But still, passengers had opted to fly and in fact, the aircraft occupancy was a healthy 55 to 60 per cent, especially in the Salem-Chennai sector.
But for the past 10 days, the flight was cancelled without reason. “We have not received any official communication so far about the cancellation. We have to face public ire,” said a travel agent.
Airport sources, however, pointed out that despite a recent hike in airfare, the flight had been doing well with the occupancy being `very encouraging.'
A leading industrialist and frequent flier told The Hindu that Kingfisher had been erratic in its operations ever since its launch. This had forced him and others to have an alternative arrangement for travel, either by train or by road.
22/12/10 R. Ilangovan/The Hindu

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Categories: Airports Dec 2010, Kingfisher Dec 2010