Analysis and Features

INFOGRAPHIC: Airline-wise share of international passenger traffic, to and from India, 2011 to 2012

Based on a report in The Economic Times we have prepared this infographic showing the airlines’ market share of international passenger traffic to and from India during fiscal 2011~2012. The chart throws up some surprises. SriLankan Airlines and Oman Air feature on this list, but Singapore Airlines does not. Hard to accept? and where is AirAsia? Share your thoughts via …

Read More »

Air India’s Emperor Class. How the Indian aristocracy abuses its “NetJets”

Air India Boeing 747-400 VT-ESP Ajanta. Image copyright Devesh Agarwal.

Officially India gained independence from monarchy on August 15, 1947. Fast forward these 66 years and the current breed of India’s aristocracy is very much alive and kicking. The British colonists may have left India, but the “Raj” continues, if only by a different name. Welcome to Air India’s Emperor Class. Not the earlier Boeing 747s, the carrier named after …

Read More »

US Aviation Review 2012: Vinay vs. Cranky Flier

by Vinay Bhaskara and Brett SnyderEarlier this month, I had a chance to do a little bit of back and forth with Brett Snyder (a.k.a Cranky Flier) about some of the biggest news stories in US aviation from last year. While the idea was that we鈥檇 do a lot of debating, it became mostly a discussion (what was that line …

Read More »

Exclusive interview: G.M. Toh, General Manager India, Singapore Airlines

Gian-Ming Toh, General Manager (India), Singapore Airlines.

Singapore Airlines (SQ) is one of the most respected airlines in the world. Bangalore Aviation was honoured to have an exclusive one-on-one with Mr. G.M. Toh, the airline’s head in India. Q. Please give us an overview of the trends you鈥檝e seen in the Indian market over the past 6 months? What do you see in the next 6 months? …

Read More »

Hooray for the courts. Drunk IndiGo passenger gets life term for hijack threat

IndiGo_A320 classic VT-INT. Photo: Devesh Agarwal.

Early in February 2009, Bangalore Aviation had advocated a strong “zero tolerance” approach to drunk passengers in Indian skies, specifically citing the case of Jitendra Kumar Mohla, a Chartered Accountant, and son of a former Air Commodore of the Indian Air Force, who boarded an IndiGo flight 6E-334 from Goa to New Delhi, in a drunk condition. Today, we are …

Read More »

Qatar Airway’s CEO Al Baker throws tantrum at Dubai air show

Airbus A350 XWB is special Qatar Airways Launch Customer livery

The recently concluded Dubai Airshow on November 15th, became the Akbar Al Baker public tantrum show. The capricious boss of Qatar Airways is known for his mercurial temper, and public berating of airframe manufacturers. At the Paris 2009 air show, it was Boeing that was at the receiving end of his verbal broadsides. At this moment, in Dubai, Boeing is …

Read More »

INFOGRAPHIC: Airline wise seat capacity offered at Bangalore

The nightly aircraft line-up tail parade at the apron of Kempegowda International Airport Bangalore

The below infographic shows the capacity offered, in seats per week, by each airline at Bangalore’s Bengaluru International Airport. Kingfisher with 65,724 seats, is still the market leader, but unlike earlier days, when the airline was considered based out of Bangalore, its lead over second place IndiGo, has shrunk significantly. IndiGo, the Gurgaon based low cost carrier is showing a …

Read More »

Bangalore airport’s hidden brain – the Airport Operation Control Centre

Runway 09 at Kempegowda airport, Bangalore. Image copyright Devesh Agarwal. All rights reserved. Used with permission.

Sitting directly opposite the western-most arrivals gate, in plain sight and yet missed by most passengers is the hidden nerve centre of Bengaluru International Airport (BIA) – the Airport Operations Control Centre or AOCC in short. The AOCC is the command, coordination and control centre for the whole airport which brings together the diverse processes relating to the three major …

Read More »

Strategy guide for Airline Manager on Facebook

October 21, 2021. An updated link to the ROI calculation spreadsheet is below Download the Airline Manager ROI Spreadsheet here. February 9, 2015. An update to this guide is appended at the end of this guide Original article July 10, 2010 Over the last two weeks I discovered a nifty little airline simulator game called Airline Manager on Facebook. My …

Read More »

Airport runways: All you wanted to know but were afraid to ask – Part 2

In the first part of this two part series on airport runways, we covered the basics of runway terminology, runway numbering, etc. Today we focus on the runway itself. The sections and parts of the runway, and terms very few outside the core aviation industry know significant details about. Common measurement terms Apart from the length and width of the …

Read More »

Airport runways: All you wanted to know but were afraid to ask – Part 1

Runway 09 at Kempegowda airport, Bangalore. Image copyright Devesh Agarwal. All rights reserved. Used with permission.

An innocent question on one of the aviation forums I visit, got me thinking. Runway numbers are very commonly used in aviation related stories and many a frequent flier knows which runway they land or take-off from, especially at their home and other frequented airports. Yet, what are the various terms associated with runways? Simply put, a runway is a …

Read More »

Timesnow TV continues scaremongering coverage of Indigo runway incursion at Mumbai

Jet Airways' Boeing 737-800 VT-JBD

Times Now TV channel, part of the Times Group media behemoth, has one of the worst reputation in the aviation industry for its scaremongering reporting and blowing the smallest of molehills into the largest of mountains. A relatively minor incident has been blown completely out of proportion. This is the opening paragraph of the report on Times Now website After …

Read More »

The shortest flight between Bangalore and San Francisco

A view of the ramp at Bangalore Airport.

Despite the downturn in the IT market, San Francisco is still one of the top destinations from Bangalore – if not first, then definitely a close second, and Singapore Airlines and fellow Asian carriers Dragonair and it’s parent Cathay Pacific has traditionally dominated this market. Traditional thinking at airlines believes that passengers prefer a shorter flight to arrive at their …

Read More »

Sanity Check: A Namma Metro link to Bengaluru International Airport

The main passenger terminal building at Bangalore Airport.

About 40 days ago, I had raised the issue of a “Sanity Check” on the proposed High Speed Rail Link (HSRL) to Bengaluru International Airport. The issues I raised were : Sanity Check 1: Who is the target customer of the HSRL ? Sanity Check 2: Convenience Sanity Check 3: Close integration with Namma Metro and BMTC Sanity Check 4: …

Read More »
+OK