Singapore Airlines to fly A380 to India from end-May

Totally Singapore Airlines along with regional carrier Silk Air operate over 100 flights to India per week

Singapore Airlines is planning to introduce Airbus A380 aircraft on its key India routes by end-May, three months after the the civil aviation ministry lifted its ban on super-jumbo plane operations, according to sources at the Mumbai and Delhi airports.

“We are keen to fly the A380 to India and are currently evaluating our plans. We will be in a position to confirm details once plans are firmed up,” Singapore Airlines (India) general manager David Lau said in an email response.

Singapore Airlines Chairman Stephen Lee Ching Yen met civil aviation secretary Ashok Lavasa on Friday and the two discussed plans about A380 flights and Tata Singapore Airlines.

Singapore Airlines currently has 19 Airbus A380s in its fleet, which it uses on routes in Asia, Australia, Europe and the US. It has five A380s on order, which would be delivered in 2017 and deploying an A380 to India would result in pulling out the plane from other routes.

At present, Singapore Airlines flies three times daily to Mumbai and Delhi with 280-300 seater Boeing 777s in two and three class configurations. This includes two night departures and a morning departure. Totally, Singapore Airlines, along with regional carrier Silk Air, operates over 100 flights to India a week. It is not clear whether the airline intends to club two night departures from Mumbai and Delhi or retain all three flights, replacing Boeing 777 with a bigger A380. The Singapore Airlines A380 can seat 409 or 471 passengers in a three-class configuration.

Singapore Airlines has a strong focus on premium products and is also a network carrier with onward connections to Australia, New Zealand and other countries in southeast Asia.

Delhi, Mumbai, Hyderabad and Bangalore airports have the infrastructure to handle the A380 flights, the civil aviation ministry had said while revoking the ban on A380 flights. In March, the Indian and Singaporean governments revised the air services agreement to enable Singapore carriers to fly A380.

The planning for the A380 operations would also include ramping up the airline catering equipment in India. Currently, Taj Sats, which supplies meals to Singapore Airlines in India, does not have A380-compliant hi lift which is used to load food trolleys from the ground into the aircraft. Taj Sats would either have to lease or purchase it from other companies or alternatively, the airline would have to carry double the quantity of meals from Singapore for the return trip.

Other foreign airlines including Emirates and Lufthansa too have shown interest to fly A380 to India. Emirates, which is the largest operator of A380, had brought the super jumbo for demonstration at  Hyderabad, signalling its seriousness to expand capacity to India. In February, India annd Dubai increased the traffic rights between the two by 11,000 additional seats over 54,000 seats.

A senior Emirates executive said the airline was looking at an additional 30,000 seats to India, which would enable the airline to introduce Airbus A380s and replace Airbus A330s on certain routes with Boeing 777. The airline is phasing out its Airbus A330s and A340s over the next two years and fears that it might have to cut down on its India operations in case additional seats are granted. It flies 185 flights a week to India now.