MIA ready to meet summer domestic & international travel needs of Namma Kudla

Planning a quick getaway for summer vacation? Then pack your bags and jet-set to a place of your choice from Mangaluru International Airport (MIA). The summer schedules introduced by the airlines from March 28 are giving passengers a lot of travel options both domestically and internationally. Passenger footfalls recorded at MIA in the last week only confirms this travel buoyancy.

Places such as Guwahati, Jaipur, Bagdogra, Kolkata, Hubballi, and even Delhi now are reachable either through direct, through, or short-layover flights. If Guwahati opens the gates to the tourist havens in the North-East such as Guwahati, Shillong, Tsomgo Lake in Sikkim – all well connected by surface transport, Jaipur via Mumbai and Bengaluru serves Rajasthan on a platter to the tourists.

A trip to Bagdogra via Bengaluru will bring you closer to Darjeeling, Chalsa, Siliguri, Guwahati, Kaziranga National Park, and the rest of the North-East. Flight to Kolkata via Bengaluru will also bring one closer to Bagdogra, Siliguri, and Chala. Closer home, weekly 4-flights to Hubballi will put one in a range of tourist spots such as Gokarna, Jog Falls, and even the UNESCO Heritage site of Hampi.

Delhi with a one-stop flight option from Bengaluru and Mumbai will place tourists at the heart of the Golden Triangle tourist circuit with Jaipur and Agra forming the other two corners of this circuit. Proximity to hill stations – Shimla, Dalhousie, Nainital, and Mussoorie makes Delhi the ideal location for one looking to beat the summer heat. MIA is now connected to Delhi via a flight from Pune.

Passenger footfalls in the last 10-days at MIA also confirm this increasing trend for both business and pleasure travel. MIA on May 1 recorded a passenger footfall of 6231 with 50 flight movements – domestic and international. On April 30, MIA recorded a passenger footfall of 5942 with 40 movements. These numbers have hovered above 4750 since April 24. Flight movements at 36 on April 25 and 29 were the least.

The summer schedule has seen domestic flight movements increase from 97 to 108 from May 1. Internationally, MIA is serving tourist hot spots – Dubai, Dammam, Bahrain, Abu Dhabi, Muscat, Kuwait – via Kannur and Vishakhapatnam, and Doha with IndiGo, SpiceJet, and Air India Express (AIE) catering to these destinations with daily and periodical flights. AIE alone caters to seven of the above middle east destinations.