Tag Archives: Devesh Agarwal

After 17 months of delay, India’s environment minister Mr. Jairam Ramesh announced approval for the new Navi Mumbai International Airport, which many consider a half-baked idea for meeting the growing civil aviation needs of India’s financial capital. Earlier this month the environment and civil aviation ministries had reached a compromise agreement on the environmental impact of the new Mumbai airport, …

At the recently concluded EADS Global Investor Forum 2010, John Leahy the chief operating officer for Airbus S.A.S. the commercial airframe manufacturer owned by the consortium revealed plans on its proposed New Engine Option (NEO) for its ultra-popular A320 family of aircraft. In this slide, Mr. Leahy unveils an artistic impression of the re-engined single-aisle narrow body airliner and outlines …

The first Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner due for delivery to national carrier Air India, VT-ANA, moved out of the paint shop on the flight line at Paine field in Everett, Washington. This is the 25th aircraft in the production line. By sheer co-incidence, the launch airline for the Dreamliner is All Nippon Airways better known as ANA. Thanks to moonm who …

Mumbai based Jet Airways (mobile website)is celebrating the crossing of 100,000 fans of its Facebook page. It is a significant statement on the growth of social networking in India that this achievement has been reached in less than a year of the airline launching its social media efforts and January 19, 2010. The airline is marking its celebration with a …

On 30th October I took an AirAsia flight from Kuala Lumpur to Bangalore. Was rather disappointed that the ground crews at the airline actively discouraged spotting, especially keeping in mind how PR savvy the airline is. Rather dejected I was walking to board my flight when I saw the AirAsia Airbus A320 9M-AFY in the Formula 1 Team Lotus livery. …

Malaysia Airlines took delivery of the airline’s first Next-Generation Boeing 737 with the new Boeing Sky Interior. The national carrier, is the first full-service airline to operate the 737-800 with the new Boeing Sky Interior. 9M-MXA also sports the new livery of Malaysia Airlines.

Since yesterday, India and Indians across the world are celebrating the festival of light — Diwali or Deepavali – the most significant festival in India. The closest equivalent I can think of is in the US, the period between Thanksgiving and Christmas. Since the Dussehra festival last month, there have been sales across the land, with people shopping away much …

US President Barack Hussien Obama extends his Diwali wishes in a White House first.

Gurgaon based low fare carrier SpiceJet, announced its fourth successive quarter of profits today. Even though, the carrier declared a meagre Rs. 100 million net profit for the second quarter (ending September 30, 2010) of the financial year 2010~2011, this is in sharp contrast to the loss of almost Rs. 1 billion compared to the same quarter last fiscal. The …

The Winter 2010 schedule for airlines commenced from Sunday and as expected major airlines, domestic and international, have announced a raft of new flights. Austrian AirlinesLufthansa group member has introduced five flights a week between Mumbai and Vienna and increased its five a week New Delhi Vienna flights to six. The Mumbai Vienna flight will be operated by a Boeing …

Last week I read an interesting article by Ajai Shukla in the Business Standard newspaper. Ajai argues that India should abandon its $10+ billion Medium Multi-Role Combat Aircraft (MMRCA) tender and directly purchase the Lockheed Martin F-35 Lighting II fifth generation multi-role fighter. While the article does tend to get a little bogged down by the politics surrounding Indian defence …

Effective November 14, 2010, Singapore based low cost carrier Tiger Airways is withdrawing its four a week Airbus A320 service between Bangalore and Singapore. The move is rather surprising since the winter season between November and February is the busiest travel period in the year. While no official reasons have been given, there are two possibilities.Singapore Airlines and its subsidiary …

In the early hours of October 23, at about 02:05 local (20:35-1 UTC) a Jet Airways Boeing 737-800 registration VT-JBR with 122 passengers and an unknown number of crew [we estimate 8], was being pushed back from parking bay 85 at Mumbai Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport, to perform flight 9W-540 from Mumbai, India to Muscat, Oman. The wing-tip of the …

A FedEx Express Boeing MD-11F registration N579FE performing flight FX-5062 from Dubai, United Arab Emirates to Bangalore, India, declared a full emergency after receiving a fire indication in the lower belly cargo hold, and diverted to Mumbai, CSI airport. The aircraft landed safely at 18:24 local (12:54 UTC) and after inspection the alarm was found to be false. The full …

The Indian government has issued a notification effectively extending the mandatory licensing deadline for most of the airports operated by the Airports Authority of India (AAI) which is a government body. “no person shall operate scheduled air transport services to/from an aerodrome with effect from the 30 June 2011, unless it has been licensed by the Directorate General of Civil …

First the facts. On October 3, 2010, a Singapore Airlines Boeing 777-300ER, registration 9V-SWK was performing flight SQ61 from Houston Bush Intercontinental, USA to Singapore via Moscow Domodedovo, Russia with 220 passengers and an unknown number of crew (the airline refused to give specific numbers). About 21:30 IST (16:00 UTC), the flight was en-route approaching the airspace over Amritsar in …

The Governments of India and the United States are in the process of entering into bilateral aviation safety agreement. As the aviation vendor base of both Boeing and Airbus increase in India, the eventual goal is for this agreement to lead to an agreement allowing for the mutual acceptance of aeronautical products and parts developed in either country. A six …

In most countries across the world, especially in North America and Western Europe, the use of mobile phones is permitted soon after the aircraft lands and exits the active runway. In India, many a passenger broke current rules by following this practice. No longer. India’s Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) is finally bringing Indian carriers in line with these …

Turkish Airlines THY took delivery of its first directly purchased 777-300ER from airframe manufacturer Boeing, registration TC-JJE. It is the first of 12 777-300ERs the airline ordered in 2009. Currently the airline operates four 777-300ERs which it leased from India’s Jet Airways in late 2008. Boeing is scheduled to deliver four additional 777-300ERs to Turkish Airlines by the end of …