Visakhapatnam airport registers 21.3% growth in passenger traffic

Visakhapatnam: After bifurcation of the State, the Visakhapatnam Airport is steadily registering comprehensive growth in the past four-and-a-half years.  There is a 21.3 per cent of growth in passenger traffic for the first three quarters in the current year.

About 21.44 lakh passengers travelled from Visakhapatnam Airport from April 1 to December 31 whereas the passengers travelled during the corresponding period of 2017-18 fiscal is 18.09 lakh.

In terms of domestic growth also, the airport registered 17.5 per cent of growth. The airport in the past three quarters in the present fiscal handled 3,833.53 tonnes of cargo against 3,260 tonnes handled during the corresponding period of last fiscal.

There is a 102.48 per cent growth registered in international cargo handling in the same period. A quantum of 3,81,347 kgs of cargo handled for first three quarters in 2018-19 fiscal against 1,88,337 kgs handled during the corresponding period of 2017-18.

With the increasing demand for flights to various destinations, two new Airlines Vistara and Go Air will be starting operations in the summer schedule from Visakhapatnam. Vistara Airlines would be operating their flights to Delhi and Go Air to Hyderabad, Bangalore, and Chennai.

The government recently included the members of Andhra Pradesh Air Travellers’ Association (APATA) in the Airport Advisory Committee (AAC). The government nominated APATA members O Naresh Kumar, D S Varma and K Vijaya Mohan as special invitees to AAC.

The members of APATA in the recent meeting asked the Airport Director to immediately make provision of ten rooms for domestic and international passengers to take rest for a short on hourly rent basis.