Bangalore Aviation News, Reviews, Analysis and opinions of Indian Aviation

Boeing is bringing the 787 Dreamliner to India for the first time. ZA002 will arrive in Delhi on July 13th. It is scheduled to proceed to Mumbai, but Boeing officials refused to indicate their plans for Mumbai. It appears the plan as of now is for the aircraft to be in Mumbai on July 15th briefly and then return on …

Just completed an eight segment trip that took me from Bangalore to Thailand and Korea on Thai Airways. Thai Airways has upgraded its daily Bangalore Bangkok service to Boeing 777-200ERs, five times a week, the other two days remaining an Airbus A330-300. The Thai B772ERs are equipped with the lay-flat Recaro seats in business class in a 2-2-2 configuration with …

Driven by rising fuel costs, growing environmental legislation, and shrinking margins, airlines from across the world have sent a clear message to airplane manufacturers by ordering massive numbers of the fuel efficient A320neo. neo which stands for New Engine Option is a re-engined version of the single aisle Airbus A320 family aircraft equipped with new engines from Pratt and Whitney …

bmi, British Midland International, Heathrow’s second largest airline, and a member of the Star Alliance will commence a thrice a week service between Amritsar and London Heathrow starting on 14 October 2011. bmi Airbus A330-242 G-WWBB. Photo copyright Devesh Agarwal. Flights will operate to London Heathrow via Almaty in Kazakhstan. bmi will be the only airline to offer a direct …

The next time you check in to the Centaur Hotel at IGI airport New Delhi, and hand over your passport and/or credit card, beware!!!!, you are exposing your personal information to the whole world. At a time when the Government of India is imposing draconian rules on internet services providers, and battles are raging on the issue of privacy, or …

Indian low cost carrier IndiGo, which controls at 19.7% share of the domestic market, announced the launch of its international operations with the release of schedules and fares. The airline which operates an all A320-232 fleet, completed the required five years of domestic operations recently, and has been granted permissions by the Ministry of Civil Aviation. IndiGo will operate its …

The promoters of New Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International Airport (IGIA) have introduced a ‘Park N Fly‘ scheme at the new Multi Level Car Park (MLCP) at Terminal 3 (T3). The car park is the largest in India with a capacity of 4300 vehicles spread across seven floors. The Park N Fly facility is available at the premium parking area on …

There is a high security alert at Bengaluru International Airport till Friday. There are enhanced security checks across all stages of embarkation. This includes a very high level of pre-embarkation checks and secondary ladder point check. These checks have been mandated by various intelligence agencies who must have some credible risk perception. Airines too are closing flights for check-in and …

Over the last month, national carrier Air India has been pilloried in the press across the the world. Stalwarts like the domestic Indian Express and the international New York Times, have exposed the rot and have even called for the closure of the airline. Exposes into the conflicts between management, board of directors, advisors, bureaucrats, politicians, labour abound, and charges …

On May 24th, Korean Air took delivery of its first Airbus A380 superjumbo in Toulouse, France. As a special tribute, the carrier’s first A380 was presented to invited guests by 500 Airbus employees – who carried blue, white and red umbrellas to form Korean Air’s tri-colour logo. The airline has specified the most extra-spacious layout amongst the six operators of …

I arrived in Zurich yesterday morning to meet my friend and Bangalore Airport President Marcel Hungerbeuhler, and do some spotting. Thanks to some other friends at Bangalore and Zurich airports (who shall remain anonymous), both Marcel and me, were met by this huge strapping guy — Rolf Wallner, one of the senior plane spotters in Switzerland with thousands of photos …

Senior spotter Murtaza Sattar played host to me on Friday 20th May for a day of spotting at Manchester Ringway airport in the United Kingdom. Unfortunately Murt’s claim that he could control everything but the weather, came true. It was dull, cloudy, rainy, cold, windy day. The photos were coming out very poorly, so I decided to use the Live …

German airline Lufthansa is simplifying and harmonising its check-in free baggage allowance policy, adopting the piece concept on all its flights globally. The new rules bring Lufthansa in sync with its North American Star Alliance partners who also follow a piece concept on all their flights. Currently, the piece concept applies to all flights to/from North America across airlines. To …

I am off on a two week trip to Europe. Along with work, I have managed to make some appointments with the leading spotters in London, Manchester, Prague, and hopefully Zurich. So if the weather cooperates, I hope to post some pictures from these airports. Flying to London via Doha on Qatar Airways. Yes, yes, after my disastrous trip almost …

A prototype of the Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd. Intermediate Jet Trainer HJT-36 Sitara serial number S-3466 crashed near Krishnagiri about 80km (50mi) south-east of Bangalore around 15:10 local (09:40 UTC). HAL HJT-36 Intermediate Jet Trainer S-3466 at Aero India 2011. Photo by Vedant Agarwal. Both pilots Wg Cdr. Patra and Mathur (rank not sure) ejected safely, though one of them has …

Earlier today passengers cheered hearing that the Supreme Court of India ruled that the charging of Airport Development Fee (ADF) by the private airport operators was incorrect. The initial cheer of air passengers flying out of Delhi though is short lived. A detailed reading of the record of proceedings of the case (read page 42 onwards) allows the operators of …

“Message expired by service” For the last two years I have been facing this problem in the SMS service of Airtel when using a Blackberry handset. Today after many attempts with the Airtel technical team, who appear determined to find a solution, I have confirmed this problem with other Blackberry users of Airtel. In normal course, if I send a …

The Supreme Court of India has ruled that the private consortia running the Delhi and Mumbai airports will not be allowed to charge an airport development fee (ADF) on passengers. The stock prices of both the GMR group which leads Delhi International Airport Ltd. (DIAL) and GVK Group which leads Mumbai International Airport Ltd. (MIAL) were hammered on the stock …

Recently, on an on-line forum, there was a great debate on how the legacy domestic carriers could deal with the issue of an empty premium class on many of their flights. Be it Air India, Jet Airways, or Kingfisher, many a time, fliers will observe just about three or four passengers in the premium class which has 20 or more …

After spending a week in bed with severe gastritis, it appears my mind and imagination are stuck in neutral. For the first time in many years, I am stuck for want of ideas for articles. Some suggestions from Bangalore Aviation readers on subjects you would like covered. Thanks in advance Devesh