Cochin International Airport Ltd (CIAL) announced its summer schedule which will be effective from 31st March to 26th October. The limelight of the schedule is the announcement of Israeli airlines Arkia which is to start direct flight from Kochi to Tel Aviv slated in September. The schedule envisages better connectivity to Kannur with the operations of three daily flights. New services to Mysore and Indore are also enlisted in the summer schedule.
The overall weekly air traffic of CIAL has increased from 1528 aircraft movements in the current winter schedule to 1672 in the upcoming summer schedule. Malaysia Airlines which had shut down operation two years ago has announced the resumption of Kochi services with a daily flight while Malindo and Air Asia will continue the existing services to Kuala Lumpur.
Indigo will commence Kannur service from March 31st itself with two daily departures at 11:35 and 21:05. Both these flights will be coming from Trivandrum. Indigo has already started booking for these flights while Go air is working on the schedule. Another new sector is Mysore, announced by Alliance Air subject to the approval from DGCA. Indigo will also start daily flight to Indore. The flight will depart Kochi at 19:25. The connectivity to all major cities in the country has increased in the summer schedule; Delhi being at the top of the list with 84 departures weekly.
There will be 83 departures to Chennai, 80 to Bangalore and 52 to Mumbai weekly. Apart from this, the schedule envisages direct connectivities to Agatti, Ahmedabad, Bhubneshwar, Bangalore, Mumbai, Kolkata, Guwahati, Goa, Hubli, Hyderabad, Jaipur, Lucknow, Chennai, Nagpur, Pune, Tirupati, Thiruvananthapuram, Tiruchirappalli and Visakhapatnam.
The international sector traffic does not feature major changes. The exception is the proposed Tel Aviv service by Arkia Airlines. It offered two weekly flights; in Tuesdays and Saturdays. The flight from Tel Aviv will arrive Kochi at 07:50 and depart at 21:45. Jet Airways has cancelled all flights in the international sector.
