Pune gives ‘Fly via Hyderabad’ a flying start,as travellers grow by the day

GMR Hyderabad International Airport Ltd CEO Vikram R Jaisinghani said,”This is a unique campaign. Travel agents from Pune have come down here and seen connectivity. They would suggest the option to clients wherein they would bag points for it. Pune is slowly seeing a good number of people taking this option.”

Having launched the scheme for domestic routes via Hyderabad,such as Bhubaneswar,Coimbatore,Kochi,Kolkata and Tirupati,among others,the airport has flights to 16 international destinations including Chicago,London,Singapore,Bangkok,New York,Jeddah,Muscat and Abu Dhabi.

Jaisinghani puts the figures at nearly 350 passengers every day between Pune and Hyderabad and expects it to increase by about 100-200 more,he said after reviewing the scheme.

“With five daily flights from Pune to Hyderabad and air travel time between these two cities being just an hour-and-a-half,this is a seamless alternative for flyers to reach their destinations. It saves at least two-three hours,on an average,” he added.

Spread over 5,495 acres at Shamshabad,the Hyderabad International Airport is a terminal designed to handle about 12 million passengers per annum. The projected capacity to 40 million passengers per annum.

‘Fly via Hyderabad’ that kicked off in Pune,will be introduced in 20 other cities in a few months. “We have been rated the world’s number one airport by the Airport Council International in terms of airport service quality. We wish to extend this experience to flyers,” Jaisinghani said.

Among airside facilities,the airport boasts the second longest runway in India with a code F category measuring 4,260 metres in length and 60 metres in width with shoulders of 7.5 meters on either side. It is also fully compliant for A-380 and with 10 exit taxiways,the 4,395 taxiway is being scheduled to work as an alternative runway soon. “The final clearances are awaited from DGCA,” said officials of the airport.

Other state-of-the-art facilities include a four-level in-line baggage handling system,136 check-in counters and 46 immigration counters. The airport is ranked number one by Airports Authority of India in the 5-15 million category.