Business as usual at Mangalore airport

A.J. Vinayak for Business line(The Hindu publication)
Mangalore airport was in news for all wrong reasons two months ago. The air crash that killed 158 people led to apprehensions that passenger movement through the airport would be affected. But the users of Mangalore airport have laid such apprehensions to rest. Passenger movement has shown a growth even after the air crash.
The airport, which handled 1.34 lakh passengers during May-June 2009, handled 1.41 lakh passengers during May-June 2010. The airport achieved this growth in spite of diversion of planes due to inclement weather conditions in the region during the period.
Mr Rajesh Sequeira, coordinator of Karnataka NRI Forum at the UAE, told Business Line that the confidence level of travellers flying from West Asia to Mangalore was unaffected by the tragedy. “The confidence level is intact because of the facilities provided by the Airports Authority of India at the airport and the advantage of saving time and money by directly flying to Mangalore. The unfortunate incident of the air crash is one part of life. But life has to go on, so the air crash will not make a difference in to our day-to-day life,” he said.
Air India Express, the lone international carrier from Mangalore to West Asia, has not seen any drop in load factor after the air-crash. Sources in AI Express said the demand for tickets from West Asia to Mangalore had not come down, and passengers still prefer Mangalore airport.
Rapid development
Mr G. Giridhar Prabhu, an entrepreneur from Mangalore, said that air connectivity was a crucial aspect in a business-driven and socially-oriented place like Mangalore, and that the traffic was bound to increase as the region was developing at a rapid pace.
The airport, which witnessed a total passenger handling of little over a million passengers between 2000 and 2005, saw a three-fold increase between 2006 and first half of 2010. This growth was led by international passengers. International operations from Mangalore airport began on October 3, 2006. From October 2006 to June 2010, the airport handled a total of 29.81 lakh passengers. Of these, the number of international passengers stood at 6.82 lakh, or nearly 23 per cent of the total passengers handled during the period.
Direct connectivity between Mangalore and West Asia has helped NRIs increase their frequency of travel. Mr Sequeira said that people would travel only once in a year or so when there was no direct flight. “But after the direct flight connection to Mangalore, the frequency of such people visiting Mangalore has increased,” he said.
The number of international flights has increased from three a week in October 2006 to 26 a week now. Mangalore airport is now connected with destinations such as Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Muscat, Bahrain, Doha, Sharjah and Kuwait.
Along with passengers from Karnataka, travellers from northern Kerala account for a significant share in the growth of passengers over the years. Recently, the Kerala Association of Travel Agents submitted a memorandum to the Mangalore Airport Director, to start flights to destinations in Saudi Arabia such as Dammam, Riyadh and Jeddah.
The memorandum had stated that a large number of Saudi-bound passengers were from north Kerala and coastal Karnataka.
Mr Prabhu said that the traffic would increase if connectivity were to be provided to other regions. “Once the new terminal opens and airlines do their diligence, Mangalore will have greater potential for convergence from, say, Africa, and stopovers from West Asia to Sri Lanka, or stopovers from the near East like Singapore into Africa,” he said.
The growth in passenger traffic was also aided by the commissioning of the second runway at the airport in 2006. The 2450-metre-long second runway helped wide-bodied aircraft to land at the airport, which was not possible earlier. The old runway's length is 1,625 metres.
AIRCRAFT MOVEMENTS
Infrastructure addition was visible with the airport witnessing a higher number of aircraft movements. Mangalore, which witnessed 5,546 aircraft movements in 2006, saw it jumping to 8,334 movements in 2007. The aircraft movements reached 11,938 and 11,148 during 2008 and 2009, respectively. There have been encouraging signals on this count in the first half of 2010, as the airport witnessed 5,440 aircraft movements till the end of June.
Air traffic at Mangalore airport is set to go up in the years to come, as the Civil Aviation Ministry is planning to extend the second runway at the airport by another 305 metres (1,000 ft). It is essential for the airport to extend the runway length by another 1000 ft to get international status. A 9,000-ft runway is one of the requirements for any airport to get international status.
Mr Sequeira said that international status will help the airport attract more airlines to international destinations. Mangalore got the status of a Customs Aerodrome in May 2006. Mr Praful Patel, who was in Mangalore to inaugurate the new terminal building of Mangalore airport on May 15, had announced that the runway would be extended by 1,000 ft. He reiterated this even after the air-crash on May 22.
With air passenger confidence intact, many facilities in place and some more in the planning stage, Mangalore airport is all set to witness further growth in the years to come
http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/2010/08/09/stories/2010080950180500.htm