The winter schedule of Cochin International Airport Ltd will be effective from October 27 to March 28, 2020 featuring new services to Damam in Saudi Arabia and Island of Hanimadhoo in Maldives.
The total aircraft movements in a week will be 1346 with the additions of new services. Fly NAS; a budget airline from Saudi Arabia will operate three services a week to Damam giving an extra fillip to CIAL’s connectivity to Saudi Arabia with airlines such as Saudia, Air India, Air India Express are already operational to various airports in that country.
Indigo has also announced new Damam service in the winter schedule apart from their Jeddah service. Island Aviation Services; an airline owned by the Government of Island Nation of Maldives will operate new thrice a week service to Hanimadhoo. CIAL is being already connected with the Island nation with a daily service operated by Indigo.
The domestic sector is catered with new services to Delhi by Go Air, Delhi and Chennai by Air Asia India, Kolkata, Chennai and Tirupati by SpiceJet. Metros such as Delhi and Bangalore will have 12 direct daily services and cities of Chennai and Mumbai will have eight services.
CIAL boasts direct connectivity to Hyderabad, Pune, Ahmedabad, Kolkata, Goa, Hubli, Kannur and Thiruvananthapuram. The international sector is being served with the presence of direct connectivity to Middle East cities, Singapore, Colombo, Bangkok, Tel-Aviv and Kuala Lumpur.
The winter schedule has been prepared in view of the runway re-surfacing work slated to be held from November 20 to March 28, 2020. The runway will be closed for operation from 10 hours to 18 hours. Majority of the flights were re-scheduled to slots in between 18 hours to 10 hours. The arrangement will see the termination of only two services in international sector and four in the domestic sector.
CIAL handles more than one million passengers annually and hectic preparations, including the extension of operational time of check- in counters, are being done to make sure hassle free passenger movement during the time of runway resurfacing work. CIAL advises passengers to utilize the extended timing of check-in counter operation to avoid last minute rush. It has been decided to operate domestic check in counter three hours prior to departures from two hours.