Aviation / Travel

Colombo Dhaka flights from 28

Best Air, Bangladesh third private airline, will commence operations to Colombo from July 28. Deccan Aviation, which operates helicopter flights in Sri Lanka, has been appointed as General Sales Agent.

“Sri Lankan Civil Aviation Authority has been granted permission to launch this operations. The frequency allocated is seven flights per week,” an official from Deccan airline said.

Initially, the lone Boeing,737-200, already in operation in Dhaka-Bangkok route, will the fly on the Dhaka- Colombo route ahead of the SAARC summit. “We are yet to decide the final frequency per week,” he said.

Two leased aircrafts would be added to strengthen the fleet of BestAir to fly to

Kuala Lumpur, Dhaka-Dubai and Dhaka-Kolkata routes. The 162-seat MD-83 will fly

on Kuala Lumpur and Dubai routes, while the 50-seat ERI-145 will f l y on Dhaka- Chittagong, Dhaka-Kolkata and Dhaka-Bangkok routes.

‘Best’Air has already got permission from the Civil Aviation Authority of Bangladesh to operate four flights a week on Dhaka Lumpur route.

Best Aviation started its journey in 1999 as a helicopter operator followed by its operation as a Freight Airline in 200O. It obtained license in 2006 from the Civil Aviation Authority to operate passenger services on the international and domestic routes. The comp any launched its passenger fleet with Boeing 737-2,00; which was the first to arrive in Bangladesh.

The aviation industry in Bangladesh has witnessed a boom with the launch of three private airlines in last one year. The industry is growing at7.5 to 8 percent a year.

KumbukRiver vying for World Award

Sri Lanka’s KumbukRiver has been picked among the world’s 10 best eco-lodges, for the second year running by the World Travel Awards, the Oscars of the travel and tourism world, the only time Sri Lanka figures among the ‘world’s leading’ classifications at the showpiece annual event which also includes awards by continent as well.

KumbukRiver, a 14-acre up-market eco-lodge by the waters of Kumbukkan Oya in Buttala is famous internationally for a spellbinding 40 feet elephant edifice which serves as an exclusive villa for visitors and will vie for the top slot when professionals from over 160,000 travel agents in over 200 countries vote for the Green Awards category at the 15 year-old event hailed as the most coveted awards scheme of the travel and tourism industry.

KumbukRiver’s dramatic entry receives further significance as the other resorts nominated are all large-scale and well-established enterprises and only 8 countries from the world are on the honours list with only 4 eco-lodges making the list from the last year, including the winners, the world-famous Daintree Eco-Lodge and Spa of Australia. Malaysia joins Sri Lanka among the only two Asian destinations.

The nomination by the WTA puts the eco-lodge from far-flung Buttala on the world tourism map, not for the first time, with KumbukRiver securing two other international accolades. KumbukRiver was short-listed for an award at the Virgin-Responsible Tourism Awards last year, while Times-Online voted it among the world’s 50 best green places to stay, making KumbukRiver the hottest Lankan destination in the world of responsible tourism.

Two other Sri Lankan entities are recognized this year by the WTA - Jetwing’s Ayurveda Pavilion has received a nomination under ‘Asia’s leading Resorts’ while Sri Lankan Airlines is named amongst Asia’s Best Airlines, completing an unexpectedly bountiful year for Sri Lanka. KumbukRiver leads Sri Lanka’s resurgence on the world tourism market.

Emirates increases Brazil service to daily

Emirates, one of the world’s fastest-growing international airlines has introduced a seventh frequency to its Brazil service, making its non-stop Dubai-Sao Paulo operation daily, effective 1st July 2008.

The popular route has been successful in facilitating travel to Sao Paulo, Brazil’s largest city and a major centre of finance and industry for South America.

The route has also established a popular gateway to onward South American destinations from Dubai and popular transit markets including the regional Middle East and Japan.

“We are very pleased with the success of our Dubai-Sao Paulo service. The introduction of a daily frequency to Brazil was a logical step for us.

We are also delighted to see that awareness of Emirates and Dubai in Brazil seems to have bolstered since our introduction of services a year ago, making the Emirate a popular new destination for Brazilian tourists and business travellers alike,” said Nigel Page, Emirates Senior Vice President Commercial Operations, The Americas.

In October 2007, Emirates’ Dubai-Sao Paulo operation became the first-ever non-stop service between South America and the Middle East. On the route, Emirates flies its state-of-the-art Boeing 777-200LR. The aircraft offers eight luxurious private suites in First class, 42 lie-flat seats in Business class, and generous space for 216 passengers in Economy.

The 777-200LR additionally carries up to18 tonnes of cargo capacity.

Passengers in all classes enjoy the meals prepared by gourmet chefs, award-winning service from its international cabin crew recruited from over 100 countries around the world, as well as Emirates’ cutting-edge ‘ice’ (information, communication, entertainment) system, which offers a selection of over 1000 channels of entertainment on demand, as well as the ability to send and receive email and text messages from their personal in-seat entertainments systems.

We have huge cash flow-Vijay Mallya

London: Prohibitive oil prices that have forced most of the airlines to reduce capacity or curtail number of flights, seem to have had no impact on the UB Group Chairman Vijay Mallya whose expansion programme and acquisition of latest aircraft for his commercial air operations continue. “I have a huge cash flow available,” he told HT.

Nor does the credit and oil crunch seem to have dampened the interest in purchasing civil and fighter planes, specially of Middle Eastern countries.

Etihad ordered 20 A-320s, 25 A-350 and 10 A-380.

It also ordered 45 planes-35, 787s and 10, 777s. The total order is worth $43 billion, based on list price. Saudis and Qatar too are on a buying binge.

The star attraction, occupying the most central and visible space at this celebrations marked Air show was Airbus A-380 next to which was parked Airbus A330-200 with Kingfisher emblazoned in large red letters. Naturally Mallya’s plane attracted equal attraction and was much talked about for the luxury it offers and the bar lounge-the only Indian carrier to have it-it has in between two compartments of First Class.

Hindustan Times