From Our Special Correspondent
Daijiworld Media Network
Bengaluru, Aug 6: Kempegowda International Airport, Bengaluru, operated by Bangalore International Airport Limited (BIAL) has achieved a record 26.9 million passengers in financial year 2017-18 and has continued its dynamic trend, achieving a remarkable growth of 32.9 percent in the first quarter compared to the same period of the previous year.
The total number of passengers who passed through BIAL in the first three months grew to 8.02 million from 6.04 million passengers during the corresponding period in FY 2017-18.
It also notched up a daily record with 98,869 passengers arriving and departing on June 30, marking it as the busiest day since start of operations.
Domestic and international passengers grew by 35.8 per cent and 16.8 per cent, respectively, primarily on the back of holiday season and special offers by airlines.
As many as 6.94 million domestic passengers and 1.08 million international fliers passed through the BLR Airport between April and June 2018. Showing a robust growth, the Air Traffic Movement (ATM) improved by 32.9 per cent, with a total of 58,054 movements as against 43,673 movements last year.
The highest-ever ATMs in a single day was 685 on May 4, 2018, as the Airport averaged 638 movements per day.
This quarter also witnessed the Cargo operations scaling new heights as a record 97,486 metric tonnes of Cargo was processed in three months, representing 16.6 per cent more than 83,584 metric tonnes handled in the first three months of FY 2017.
The 34,398 metric tonnes of cargo processed in the month of June alone helped the airport to set another new monthly record in the history of the Airport.
International cargo processed during the period was 61,888 metric tonnes (15.5 percent growth over 53,583 MT same period last year) while the domestic was 35,598 MT (18.7 percent over 30,001 MT same period last year).
As many as 33 passenger airlines — eight domestic and 25 international airlines — connected Bengaluru with 67 destinations (45 domestic and 22 international), during this period.
Gulf Air, which started operations on May 1, 2018, is the new addition, connecting Bengaluru to Bahrain with daily flights. A total of 11 cargo airlines, including one domestic and 10 international, connect Bengaluru.
The top domestic destinations during the first quarter were Delhi (1,115,145), Mumbai (875,474) and Kolkata (473,089) while the top international destinations were Dubai (209,425), Singapore (163,638) and Abu Dhabi (77,166).
Meanwhile, the BIAL Airport continued to show a strong On Time Performance (OTP), a key performance indicator, achieving on-time departures of 85.6 percent.
“The key factors, that have enabled us to deliver in such challenging times, are timely expansion of facilities, implementation of cutting edge technology and innovation and developing services centered around providing a seamless, easy customer experience,” said Hari Marar, MD & CEO, BIAL.
“As we move forward, our priorities will be to introduce innovative and digital solutions that will redefine airport experience and strengthen our role as an economic driver for the region. We look forward to building on this excitement and driving continued growth and transformation in 2018,” Marar added.