BIAL Official Updates October 2007

7 November 2007 - 9:16am — vlnarayan

Construction progress update for October 2007 The highlight this month included the commissioning of passenger boarding bridges, transformers, CCTV cameras, fire alarm system in the terminal building. Elevators were commissioned at both, the terminal building as well as the Air Traffic Control building. Airfield lights commissioning continued at the airside. The Terminal building The external painting of the west wall of the building continued. The works within the terminal building including the flooring, glass cladding of the columns, glass façade installations are nearing completion. The glass cladding for the 8 fixed links are in progress Installation work on other facilities like the elevators and escalators, automatic doors, check in counter, baggage handling system are continuing. The work within the duty free and food and beverage area on the first floor of the terminal building is gaining momentum. Airside Works The approach light work having been concluded at the runway, the work on the taxiway lights instillations is now nearing completion. In addition, the instillation of light poles for the airside wall illumination is nearing completion. Cabling works for these are now in progress. On the Apron area, laying of the final concrete layer is nearing completion. Other buildings & infrastructure -At the ATC tower, the aluminium composite panel (ACP) cladding and glass fixing works are nearing completion. -The earthworks for the main access road outside the boundary wall of the airport are nearing completion. Landscaping works along the main access road have now commenced. -Nav-Aid (navigation aid) buildings: All the Nav-Aid buildings are nearly completed and are ready to be handed over to the Airports Authority of India.

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Beeline To Bangalore

tsubba - 30 Nov 2007 - 8:06am

International Airlines Rush To Touch Down On Bangalore

International air carriers are making a beeline for connecting Bangalore. Swiss Air, Qatar Airways, Oman Air and Etihad are planning to touch Bangalore while US-based Continental and Northwest are looking at launching operations from the city.

These airlines will look at covering Bangalore once the new greenfield airport at Devanahalli starts operations from March 2008. With these new entrants, the number of international carriers operating out of the city is expected to go up from the existing the 12 to around 20 from the new airport.

International traffic too is expected to go up from 1.4 million to over 2 million next year. According to Airports Authority of India (AAI), Bangalore reported highest growth in international passenger traffic; about 40% as against the national average of 16% from September 2006 to August 2007.

“Considering that corporate international travel is highest out of Bangalore, the city has become a strategic location in India. We plan to launch flights from Bangalore to Doha and Qatar early next year. Frequency of operations is subject to bilaterals. Meanwhile, we have already set up an office in Bangalore,” Qatar’s regional manager, Naveen Chawla, said.

Connectivity to the Gulf from the city is catered by Emirates, Air Arabia and Gulf Air besides domestic carrier Air India. Oman and Etihad is set to join the list soon and domestic carrier Deccan is also eyeing the Gulf region. Acting Country Manager of Etihad Airways Neerja Bhatia says, “we are very keen on operating flights from Bangalore to Abu Dhabi. We have requested the Indian government for traffic rights. Ideally we would want to launch daily flights from Bangalore.”

Connectivity to the US and Europe is also set to improve with international and domestic carriers such as Air India, Jet and Kingfisher Airlines planning to start operations to New York, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Canada and London. Existing international carriers such as Lufthansa and British Airways too could look at increasing their seat capacity from Bangalore.

“As and when we plan to launch operations from the south, Bangalore will be our launchpad. The city is definitely on our radar,” says marketing manager (India) of Swiss Air, Aditya Khullar. Meanwhile, Asian carriers such as Singapore Airlines, Thai Airways, Sri Lankan Airlines and Malyasia Airlines are also planning to increase their existing frequencies from Bangalore.

Being a greenfield project, Bangalore International Airport will be able to expand to cater to the traffic growth. In the first year of operations BIAl is expected to handle around 10.5 million passengers. Currently the HAL airport handles close to seven million passengers. Bangalore’s total traffic growth (domestic and international air traffic) was 38%, the highest among all the major metros and above the country’s average of 28% from September 2006 to August 2007, according to AAI data.

Advanced Baggage Handling At BIAL

tsubba - 29 Nov 2007 - 6:12am

International Airport To Have Better Baggage Management
DH News Service

Promoters of the upcoming international airport in Devanahalli are set to address worries over missing and mishandled baggage through an integrated passenger-baggage reconciliation system. Through the system-to be deployed by leading air transport industry service provider SITA-the passenger baggage could be tracked across the world.

Speaking to reporters on Wednesday, Elyes M’Rad, Regional Vice President, SITA said the system would go a long way in bringing down losses for airlines due to misplaced baggage.

Annually, airlines the world over suffer losses running up to $ 4 billion on misplaced baggage. The system (see box) integrates barcodes, Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN) and IP-based global connectivity.

Cost Factor
Marcel Hungerbuehler, Chief Operating Officer, Bangalore International Airport Limited said though the Baggage Reconciliation System (BRS) was not part of BIAL’s original central infrastructure, the system had to be adopted to ensure that losses over misplaced baggage are cut down.

“The cost will be much higher if every airline sets up individual BRS. A centralised system will work out much cheaper,” Hungerbuehler said. Airlines will have to spend Rs 1.1 per baggage on the service.

The system comprises two modules-BagManager and BagMessage-that will ensure that all baggage are linked to the airport security systems and also ensure the latest information on the baggage, whenever required. The airport also has a wi-fi enabled terminal, Common Use Terminal Equipment (CUTE) and barcode gate boarding, he said.

The BRS will be in place when the airport starts operations on March 30, 2008, according to SITA officials. They said that it will be the first integrated BRS in an Indian airport.

The BRS Difference
The baggage is screened after the passenger checks in. It’s given a unique identity and baggage image registered. It goes through more screening systems, including the Explosive Detection System, before it’s loaded on to the aircraft. The location is tracked all through and the information is matched with the passenger process.
That is, if the passenger doesn’t board the aircraft, the baggage will be off-loaded from the aircraft. The average time taken to off-load the baggage is eight minutes. Statistics reveal that while 35 million bags don’t reach the destination every year, six in every 1,000 bags are mishandled.

BIAL Trials By Dec

tsubba - 29 Nov 2007 - 6:06am

Devanahalli Trials In December
Deccan Herald

The Bangalore International Airport Limited (BIAL) will commence basic trials at the upcoming greenfield airport in Devanahalli in December.

Marcel Hungerbuehler, Chief Operation Officer, BIAL said on Wednesday that the advanced, integrated trials at the airport will begin in January next year. The airport is set for a March 30, 2008 opening. The construction of the airport is almost complete and work on the runway is over. In its first year of operation, the airport is expected to handle 10.5 million passengers.

Connectivity Issues
Addressing the much-debated issue of poor connectivity from the City to the airport, Hungerbuehler said long-term plans including a mass transit system, were the need of the hour. “The growth in air traffic is going to continue and unless we have a mass transit system for passengers commuting to and from the City, the issue of connectivity will stay,” he said.

The Chief Operation Officer said there was a need to improve the traffic situation at road junctions. Work on the trumpet interchange, that diverts traffic from NH 7 to the airport, is on.

SET TO FLY
** Basic trials in December, advanced trials from next year
** Airport set for a March 30 opening
** To handle 10.5 million passengers in first year

BIAL Navigation System

tsubba - 11 Nov 2007 - 9:10am

Blinding fog can hit flights at new hi-tech airport (ToI, 11/11/2007) Forget the HAL airport, landing in severe/blinding fog will not be possible even at the brand new Bangalore International Airport (BIAL) at Devanahalli. The airport — to be opened within the next 150 days — will not have the world’s most popular hi-tech landing facility, the Category 3 Instrument Landing System (ILS), that enables blind landing. The decision not to have the equipment was not BIAL’s, but civil aviation ministry’s. The ministry took the decision after considering several factors and consulting a high-level committee of aviation officials. Had the Bangalore airport opted for the Category 3 system, aircraft with a visibility of only 50-100 metre or none at all (that is if the fog is so thick you can only see 50 metre or nothing ahead of you) can still land purely based on signals sent by the Instrument Landing System (radars) to the aircraft. The landing will entirely be instrumentbased, the pilot will have no need to see the runway and the aircraft will land using autopilot. The reason behind the ministry’s decision could be its high cost — at least Rs 300 crore — for equipment on the ground. Corresponding fixtures in aircraft too are expensive. Airlines would have to invest large amounts to make aircraft compatible and also to train pilots. “Category 3 would mean spending both by the airport and airlines, about Rs 1,000 crore in all. An occasional two-hour fog in Bangalore does not justify the investment,” a top official said. The ministry also studied meteorological data on Bangalore fog which said it is not as serious as in Delhi or Mumbai, not warranting this equipment. In four winter months, Bangalore’s fog lasts less than 10 days of twohour duration on an average, while Delhi is shut for over a month. “Does this warrant high-cost operations like Category 3,” an official asked. Now, very few pilots in India are trained in instrument landing. Except for some pilots in Indian, Jet Airways and may be now Kingfisher Air, most other aircraft do not have systems or pilots to fly such systems. “Considering these, the government decided such equipment is not viable for Bangalore,” an aviation official said. But air pollution and smog in Bangalore is going up and is expected to intensify. Why not have a hi-tech landing system that will take care of this eventuality? However, this is a decision the aviation industry and government have to take together. The new airport will, however, have Category 2 ILS, which will allow pilots to land with a visibility of 400 metre — they can land in moderate fog. Only Delhi airport has Category 1 landing.

glass

tsubba - 9 Nov 2007 - 6:17pm

the roof elements are near vertical and facing south. the glass walls too are either facing north(air side) or south(city side). city side has a huge canopy too.

BIAL Nov Pics

tsubba - 8 Nov 2007 - 5:35pm

click for bigger pictures. (source bialairport.com) archived for later.

Deccan's Air Shuttle

tsubba - 7 Nov 2007 - 9:26pm

Beating Bangalore traffic: Deccan pitches copter ride to new airport(Live Mint) Deccan Aviation Ltd, which owns nine helicopters, plans to operate an intra-city chopper shuttle service in the state capital. This is to ferry to the new airport on Bangalore’s outskirts passengers who wish to avoid the city’s notorious traffic gridlocks. We have two helicopters in Bangalore. One can be put into shuttle service once the new airport starts,” says Capt. G.R. Gopinath, executive chairman of Deccan Aviation, which also runs India’s biggest low-cost airline. Based in Bangalore, Deccan is preparing a detailed business plan for operating the heli-charter service, which will be ready by the month-end, Gopinath adds. A BIAL spokesperson declined to comment on the planned service. Deccan has identified two helipads, one in Palace Grounds in the heart of the city and another at UB City, a commercial complex owned by the UB Group. Group company United Breweries (Holdings) Ltd, which runs Kingfisher Airlines Ltd, owns 26% of Air Deccan. “The helicopter service will serve a small number of people. But the bigger issue of smooth transfer of the 40,000-odd passengers who use the airport every day will remain,” says Gopinath. Delhi Metro Corp. Ltd, which has built the metro rail in the country’s Capital, has submitted a proposal to the local government for a mass transit system to the airport. “We need a good underground metro that will take passengers to the airport,” adds Gopinath.

Inside lighting

s_yajaman - 7 Nov 2007 - 11:36am

Tarle, I really like their design as far as inside lighting goes. Having skylights makes so much sense. Am sure it cuts a fair bit on cost and emissions as well. How they keep it clean is another question. Am sure brunner must have thought about it. Am sure no one in the bureaucratic circles must have ever thought that this would be done on time :). they must have thought 2010 admele idu shuru aggothe. Iglinda yaake tale kedesukobeku? Srivathsa

Drive safe. It is not just the car maker which can recall its product.

glass facade

blrsri - 7 Nov 2007 - 3:21pm

its always good to have good lighting with such design but it also lets in heat during our hot summers..and the a/c will need to over work then! so it might not be helping much..that is the case with all our new age buildings.. US has glass facades for their bldgs cos the weather there is cold in most parts and this helps in saving energy...not sure if the same works here and dunno why we want to ape them !! one nice way to save energy was the bldg at infosys which is naturally cool..thats interesting

progress

tsubba - 7 Nov 2007 - 10:28am

i think it is amazing the speed at which these guys are moving, despite the re-design. aside: i had written to them 2 days back, about the date problem. they did not reply back to me, but got the problem fixed.

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