As the country plans to resume scheduled commercial international flights from March 27, Cochin International Airport Limited (CIAL) is set to see more traffic in both the international- and domestic sectors. According to the summer schedule, which will come into effect in March and will be operational till October 29, CIAL will have 1,190 weekly flights against 848 during the winter schedule.
CIAL's summer schedule will see 20 airlines operating to destinations abroad among which 16 are international carriers operating 261 weekly departures. Indigo tops the list with 42 weekly departures to international destinations whereas Air India Express will have 38 departures weekly; AirAsia Berhad 21, Etihad 21, Emirates 14, Oman Air 14, Qatar Air 14, Air Saudi Arabia 14, Kuwait Air eight, Thai Air Asia four, Sri Lankan Air 10, Gulf Air seven, Singapore Airlines seven, Spicejet six and FlyDubai three.
A communication from CIAL said there would be 44 weekly departures to Dubai. Abu Dhabi comes second with 42 operations. Air India Express will continue its three weekly operations to London and Thai Air Asia will resume its operations from Kochi in June, with four weekly direct flights to Bangkok. “After a hiatus of two years AirAsia Berhad will also have daily services to Kuala Lumpur in March itself,” the communication added.
The CIAL schedule for the summer has 668 domestic operations for the season offering connectivity with 13 cities in the country which includes 63 weekly flights to Delhi, 55 to Mumbai, 39 to Hyderabad, 49 to Chennai, 79 to Bangalore and seven to Kolkata. There will be daily flights to Pune, Thiruvananthapuram, Mysore, Kannur, Hubli, Agati and Ahmedabad.
CIAL, which had been handling 10 million passengers a year during the pre-pandemic days, implemented a slew of measures to increase the traffic during the period. CIAL handled a total of 43,06,661 passengers during the whole year of 2021. Of that, 18,69,690 were international passengers. CIAL’s passenger volume has almost increased by a million in 2021 when compared to that of 2020, the communication added.
