Also plans frequency increase from other Indian destinations
By Kanika Mehta | New Delhi

Singapore Airlines will increase its frequency from New Delhi through the addition of two more flights. The two new services will start operations from 30th March 2008. The airline will now operate nine flights in a week from Delhi. It will use the Boeing – 777 – 200 aircraft, with a three class configuration.

These new flights have been called ‘Sunrise’ services. In addition to the daily night flights from Delhi, there will be two morning flights on Friday and Sundays from New Delhi to Singapore. “Our new Sunrise services will provide convenient connectivity to our customers travelling to and beyond Singapore to destinations in South East Asia, Australia and New Zealand. This will increase Singapore Airline’s capacity from New Delhi, by almost 24 per cent,” said CW Foo, General Manager - India, Singapore Airlines.

To promote the new services, Singapore Airlines has introduced special economy class fares to key destinations, which include Singapore; Kuala Lumpur, Penang and Langkawi in Malaysia; Denpasar and Lombok in Indonesia; Beijing, Shanghai, Canton and Shenzhen in China; Hong Kong; Australia; New Zealand; and Manila, Cebu and Davao in Philippines. The bookings close on March 15, whereas the offer is valid from March 30 to May 15, 2008.

Also, Singapore Airlines plans to start double daily flights from Bangalore, which currently operates ten flights per week. It also wants to fly triple flights daily from Mumbai, wherein the airline operates 14 flights per week.

The airline also intends to ply daily double flights from New Delhi, in the near future. Foo maintains that this should be possible within 18 months. Cities such as Pune which are growing and developing well in the Indian market are also being considered by the airline. “We are also looking at expanding our international destination network and considering exotic locations like Bali and Vietnam. We are working with Tourism Australia for jointly promoting our flights to five destinations in Australia”, adds Foo.

SilkAir, the subsidiary regional airline of Singapore Airlines is also looking at starting operations from Vishakhapatnam. Currently, it operates daily flights from Kochi, four flights from Thiruvanthapuram and three flights per week from Coimbatore.