Recent News

10th May, 2022: Aviator Airport Alliance, a full-range provider of aviation services at 15 airports across the Nordics and a family member of Avia Solutions Group, leaders in end-to-end capacity solutions for passenger and cargo airlines worldwide, has signed a new contract with PLAY, an Icelandic low-cost carrier. Under the new partnership, Aviator Airport Alliance will provide PLAY with ground handling and de-icing services at 2 stations in Norway – Stavanger and Trondheim airports. With the newly signed contract, the companies are embarking on a two-year-long partnership. While the cooperation in Norway is brand new, PLAY is already an existing client for Aviator at Copenhagen airport. Peter Stackeryd, Commercial Director of Aviator Norway, commented: “This is a truly exciting development. We are delighted to add Fly Play to the list of our trusted partners. As this is not the first time the airline chooses to work with Aviator, we see this partnership as an acknowledgement of our service quality and industry expertise.” Nadine Guðrún Yaghi, the director of communications at PLAY, commented: “Choosing the right partners is never an easy task, yet by entrusting our ground support to the competent team of Aviator, we can rest assured that everything will go according to plan. We are glad to be working with Aviator and trust that the company is a good match to our high standards and requirements as an airline.”

Movie Review Runway 34 movie cast: Ajay Devgn, Rakul Preet Singh, Amitabh Bachchan, Boman Irani, Aakansha Singh, Angira Dhar Director: Ajay Devgn Aviation has zero tolerance toward safety. There are certain rules which has to be followed by everyone, be it passengers or crew. Ajay Devgn’s aviation thriller ‘Runway 34’ starts on a very cruising note with the glamour quotient of being at Dubai Airport and flight commander’s attitude of 16000 Hrs of flying at its best. The superstar boasts of confidence and command over flight, bit of arrogance due to his seniority and some applause for challenging flight operation in Hong Kong . The pilot in command, Capt. Vikrant Khanna is shown as an over confident pilot who scans the flight plan and weather updates within the blink of eye. While cruising at an altitude of 34000 feet, Capt Khanna smells the uninvited turbulent weather waiting on path of the Cochin Airport Runway. He ignores the advice of his co-pilot first officer Tanya Alburqurque, role played by Rakul Preet Singh. The ATC staff who was navigating the flight to Cochin Airport seemed to be exhausted by his personal loss. His casual work approach kept the cockpit aloof of the alarming weather situation and last minute diversion updates to Bangalore from Trivandrum ATC. Ajay Devgn as Capt Vikrant Khanna has played a very sensitive and responsible pilot who knew things are not going to be easy for him and as a result with no options left amid shortage of fuel, he called the ATC “mayday”, which in aviation is a distress call that is used to signal a life-threatening emergency by the pilot in command. After failed landing approach at Trivandrum airport,with his previous experience of landing at this table top runway, Capt Vikrant Khanna asked the ATC to navigate and clear landing from Runway 34, which has harsh tail wind towards approach. Which means, strong winds will push aircraft forward and it will be difficult to control speed and it might fall in the deep gorge ahead. He managed to retard the wing flaps after harsh landing and control the brakes of the aircraft just at the end of the runway which looked slightly filmy better scripted to showcase the heroic act of superstar. This action of him initiated investigation and Amitabh Bachchan as the Chief of Aircraft Investigation Board has done full justice to his role. Aviation is a very subjective matter and one need to very specific about what they say and what they do. Amitabh Bachchan speaks pure Hindi words which sometimes make other co-actors looking for its meaning. Supporting role by Boman Irani as airlines chief, Angira Dhar as corporate lawyer and other actors seemed to be fitting best as per the script requirements. To conclude, I would say that Runway 34 is one good approach of Bollywood that they tried to attempt making movie out of such a serious safety issue. Few scenes are technically brilliant and shooted with best of VFS impact, dialogues are well delivered, actual shoot at sim facility is also well curated which will be certainly new for the mass audience to know about. One inside fact about aviation is that there are many incidents where senior commanders ignore advice of their junior co-pilots so what is shown in this movie is a bare truth of the industry. (By Vishal Kashyap, Managing Editor, Aviation World)

19th April 2022; Colombo SriLankan Airlines records its first profitable fourth quarter (Q4) since 2006 for the financial year that ended on 31 March 2022 with a group net profit of USD 1.7 million despite pandemic challenges. The airline was able to achieve this financial turnaround through various measures in its 2021-22 financial year including scaling down staff costs and overheads; renegotiating supplier contracts; increasing cargo revenue; and creating an ambitious growth plan capitalizing on pent-up travel demand. The initiatives paid off, with SriLankan making its first monthly profit since the onset of COVID-19 in December 2021 and continuing with a profit in the final quarter. The airline now has accumulated over USD 12 million in profits over the last 4 months as traffic has returned after the pandemic. SriLankan’s expansion initiative saw the launch of flights to several new destinations in the last year including Seoul; Moscow; Kathmandu and Paris. Frequencies were also gradually increased across the airline’s network in line with the recovery of the global travel industry and demand. The airline has also carried out major campaigns to boost tourism to the country including a major initiative in India, roadshows supporting new routes and most recently sponsoring the popular French annual adventure trail, Raid Amazones, in March of this year. The airline is now back to 75 per cent of the passenger revenue it made pre-pandemic in Q4 of 2019-20. Correspondingly, passenger numbers also rose to near 700,000 for the quarter. The airline is making strong headway towards matching pre-pandemic levels as demand for international travel recovers. The payoff is not limited to the airline, as it remains by far the largest carrier of tourists into Sri Lanka. SriLankan is also a net foreign currency earner for the country owing to a sizeable share of its revenue being generated from international markets. Ashok Pathirage, Chairman of SriLankan Airlines stated, “I am pleased to note that we ended 2021-22 on a high note, given our first quarterly profit in many years. The passenger demand remained strong, and revenues continued to recover from the setbacks of the pandemic during the quarter. Our annual expenditure remained within expectations. I am thankful to all our valued employees for contributing towards this achievement.” “We anticipate some headwinds in the first half of this financial year with high fuel prices and a short-term dip in demand to Sri Lanka. We have factored in these challenges and are working towards minimizing the impact with a strong business plan and a sound turnaround strategy to return to full-year profitability. Traffic is expected to recover fully by the end of the year as travel restrictions are eased off further. We will continue to support the tourism industry of Sri Lanka and be a catalyst for economic recovery,” added Richard Nuttall, Acting Chief Executive Officer of SriLankan Airlines.