Category: Aviation

Aug 27, 2008 (LBO) – Sri Lankan Airlines expects to replace its older fleet of short haul Airbus A320s with new deliveries starting December and will also make Etihad its main code-share partner, a top official said.Though the aircraft would be more expensive, falling lease rentals in the wake of interest rate falls and better […]

Aug 23, 2008 (LBO) – Sri Lanka tourism promotion office said it is negotiating lower airport fees and providing marketing support to keep Germany’s Condor charter flying to the country, during the 2008 winter season. “Condor’s uninterrupted operation every fortnight to Colombo will ensure a steady flow of German visitors to Sri Lanka,” Sri Lanka […]

Aug 20, 2008 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s national carrier SriLankan Airlines has posted a 4.8 billion rupee profit with capital gains from aircraft sales, in a year that it was hit by rising fuel costs and weak tourist arrivals to the island. The carrier had lost 6.1 billion rupees (57 million US dollars) on its […]

Aug 19, 2008 (LBO) – Dubai-based Emirates said two of its pilots from Sri Lanka were among the first to fly the new Airbus A380 super jumbo aircraft. Suren Ratwatte has flown the prototype aircraft registered as F-WWDD out of Airbus Industries home airfield in Toulouse France on June 18, while Suhail Hashim flew the […]

July 30, 2008 (LBO) – Sri Lankan authorities plan to suspend domestic flights to northern Jaffna later this week for the duration of a summit of south Asian leaders in Colombo, a senior government official said.Civil Aviation Authority director general Parakrama Dissanayake said flights by domestic carriers between Colombo and Jaffna have been suspended during […]

July 28, 2008 (LBO) – Sri Lanka’s ports and aviation ministry has stopped work on a controversial new international airport in the island’s south and decided to shift it to a new location. Sri Lanka has only one international airport at present and needs a second one under international air safety rules so flights can […]

July 23, 2008 (LBO) – Best Air, a private Bangladeshi carrier, will start direct flights from Dhaka to the Sri Lankan capital Colombo catering to growing traffic between the two countries, an official said. Best Air chairman Haider Uzzaman said they plan to start with two flights a week to Colombo and Male on Fridays […]

July 22, 2008 (LBO) – Sri Lankan Airlines plans to reduce flights to cut costs amid soaring fuel prices but said the new schedule would not affect key passenger segments like tourists and migrant workers. The state-owned airline said in a statement it will go ahead with re-fleeting plans by replacing four old aircraft with […]

July 2, 2008 (LBO) – The United Arab Emirates has started a new budget airline branded ‘FlyDubai’, but the carrier would be run separately from the full-service, Emirates, the company said in a statement. “FlyDubai is a simple, yet powerful call to action,” Sheikh Ahmed Saeed Al-Maktoum who also owns Emirates Airlines, said in a […]

June 28, 2008 (AFP) – Sri Lanka’s national carrier, Sri Lankan Airlines, will re-introduce a fuel surcharge to cover rising jet fuel costs, the airline said Saturday. “Sri Lankan Airlines has re-introduced the fuel surcharge for travel and ticketing effective July 1,” the airline said. It said flights between Sri Lanka and Southeast Asian countries […]

June 26, 2008 (LBO) – The passenger and cargo operations of Emirates in Sri Lanka have won two of the carrier’s global performance awards in 2007-08, the airline said in a statement. It received the Outstanding Achievements Award in the Passenger category and the Best GSA Award from Emirates SkyCargo at Emirates’ worldwide, annual commercial […]

NEW DELHI, June 26, 2008 (AFP) – An Air India flight headed for Mumbai overshot its destination and was halfway to Goa before its dozing pilots were woken out of a deep slumber by air traffic control, a report said.The high altitude nap took place approximately two weeks ago, the Times of India reported Thursday. […]