A journey from Mumbai to Lonavala Hill Station will now take less than 30 minutes, weather permitting. Maritime Energy Heli Air Services Pvt Ltd (MEHAIR) on Monday launched what is being termed as mainland India’s first seaplane service in partnership with Maharashtra Tourism Development Corporation. Today, the first flight with nine passengers onboard a Cessna 208 (nine-seater) aircraft took off at around 12 noon to cover the nearly 100-km stretch between Juhu (Mumbai) and Pawana Dam (Lonavala). In 2011, the company had pioneered this service in the Andaman & Nicobar Islands.

“It’s a big day for me …It’s a big day for Mumbai,” said MEHAIR co-Founder and Director Siddharth Verma. At the controls of the aircraft was Capt Priyanka Manuja, India’s first seapilot.

In addition to the Cessna 208, MEHAIR has a Cessna 206 Amphibian (four-seater) which will be used for private charters on an hourly basis. A one-way trip to Pawana dam — onboard the Cessna 208 — has been priced at ₹2,999 per person for the time being. Going forward, services will also cover Mula Dam near Shirdi, Gangapur dam in Nashik and Dhoom dam near Mahabaleshwar. In a conversation with BusinessLine, Verma throws more light about the company’s future plans. Edited excerpts:

You have priced services at ₹2,999 for a 26 minute ride…Is the pricing going to be sustainable going forward?

Well the pricing is part of the inaugural offer so that customers can come forward and try the service. After September 15, there will be a revision in prices, but not by that much. The demand has been very strong. Our server crashed the first day we opened bookings because of excessive workload. However, we have rectified the problem now. Weekend flights have already been sold out, despite the fact that we will be running two daily services between Friday and Sunday.

Few flight commanders in this country are trained in amphibian operations. Given that you have plans to further expand the network, how will the company address this problem?

When we started our operations in Andaman three years back, we were compelled to hire expatriate pilots because there weren’t enough trained hands in India. However, now we have trained our own batch of pilots. MEHAIR is planning to establish a conversion school (for those who want to transition from a commercial pilots license (CPL) to a seaplane) and maintenance repair and overhaul unit. We have 2-3 States in mind for these endeavours. Currently, we have six pilots in all, including two expatriates.

By when will your operations break even financially?

In this business, you can only break even only once you have the second and third aircraft. Currently, we are operating with two aircraft and we have the third one on order. So, I think we are on track to break even by end of the year. We have been in this business for the last three and half years, so we understand the costing environment quite well. On a standalone basis, Maharashtra operations should break even by the end of the year. Andaman was profitable and hence we decided to come here.

Will you be adding more aircraft to the inventory? Will the Cessna Amphibian class of planes be the preferred carriers for the company going forward?

By the end of this year, we are hopeful of adding two more aircraft. This would take our fleet size to four for the seaplane service. This year, we are only looking at the Cessna Amphibian class of aircraft. Next year, based on the response, we may also add the Viking 400 to the fleet.

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