Air India Express, subsidiary of Air India operating low-cost flight services, will expand its services from Kochi with the introduction of daily flights to Singapore later this month.
At present Air India Express operates three days a week flights to Singapore via Madurai. The new flights will link Singapore via Bengaluru from October 29, airline sources said here.
Bengaluru will thus be the 18th city to join the network operated by Air India Express, which has its headquarters in Kochi.
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The airline will emerge as the largest air service operator from Kerala with Kochi and Thiruvananthapuram already in the network and Kannur joining the network with the airport’s inauguration. Kannur will be the 19th city in the network.
At present Air India Express operates 92 services a week out of Kochi.
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The airline will soon acquire its 25th aircraft. The 24th aircraft was inducted earlier this month.
The airline has 600 services a week across Indian cities connecting West Asia and Singapore.
The sources said that the airline was the hardest hit by the mid-August floods in Kerala. The Cochin International Airport was shut down for 15 days after the facility was flooded. However, the airline operations have bounced back. Despite the setback suffered during the floods in Kerala, the airline has been ranked 14th worldwide in September 2018 in terms of on-time performance by OAG, an air travel data company based in the United Kingdom.
Services from Kannur
Air India Express has, in the meanwhile, received slot approval from the Kannur airport authority. It has also submitted its proposal for flight operations from Kannur once the airport is inaugurated later this year.
The sources said that approval from the Directorate General of Civil Aviation was being awaited and that the airline was hopeful of opening services to six cities in West Asia from Kannur.