E-Paper
International flights from January 2022 likely: Pune airport director
Once the full fledged operations start at the airport (December 1), there is a possibility that airlines will be given consent for international flights, says Pune airport director
Pune: No commercial international flight has operated at Pune’s Lohegaon airport from March 2020. That could change from January 2022.
“Once the full fledged operations start at the airport (December 1), there is a possibility that airlines will be given consent for international flights. Nothing yet has been finalised, but we are hoping that international flight operations may start from January 2022,” said Santosh Dhoke, airport director.
The offical Twitter handle of the Lohegaon airport is already getting queries for flights to Dubai.
Regular flyer Bihan Sarkar said, “Travelling becomes easy when a flight is available from Pune, we fly to Dubai once in a year. I hope flights start again, due to Covid I have not travelled since last two years.”
The airport is seeing massive crowds after it restarted operations on October 30. A total of 56 domestic flights are operating and footfall has reached 18,000.
Lohegaon airport currently connects 21 cities.
“We have already provided new slots. First the airlines check viability before starting any new flight. After 24×7 operations start, there is scope for new flights to be added,” said Dhoke.
“Work on the multistorey parking and new terminal is going on and we are expecting to complete it within the estimated deadline,” said Dhoke.
The deadline for the parking lot is January 2022 and for the new terminal is September 2022.
