Sri Lankan Airlines Increases Flights To GCC Countries

Sri Lankan Airlines, the flag carrier of Sri Lanka, is increasing its flight frequency to Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries from its hub at Colombo’s Bandaranaike Airport. The airline is further planning to diversify its range of services to bank on the sizeable growth in inbound air travel traffic.

Furthermore, there has been a spate of cheap flights to Colombo from the GCC countries because of increasing competition, during the last five years. Sri Lanka has witnessed a 43.2 per cent increase in number of holiday makers looking for tickets to cheap flights to Colombo from GCC countries.

From December 23, Sri Lanka’s national airline will be operating two extra flights between Colombo and Muscat, thereby increasing its total frequency to four weekly flights. The flights to Muscat from Colombo will be operated on Sundays, Mondays, Wednesdays and Thursdays.

Recently, the airline increased its flight frequency from Doha to Colombo from five to seven flights per week. Additionally, the airline is working on plans to operate daily flights from Abu Dhabi, Dubai and Kuwait and increase as many as five flights between Colombo and Riyadh and Jeddah.

Sri Lankan Airlines operates 64 flights every week to seven Indian cities - Bangalore, Mumbai, Madras, Delhi, Trichy, Thiruvananthapuram and Kochi and is also expected to increase to 77 flights per week after December 23.

Besides the increased flight frequency, the airline has recently got into a revamp of its fleet, which will be completed by July, 2012. Sri Lankan is expected to offer remarkable travel experience with swish interiors and a traditional Sri Lankan aura.

The airline is already offering easy links to its global route network of 60 destinations in Europe, Middle East, South Asia, Southeast Asia, Far East, North America and Australia.