SriLankan Airlines Resumes Flights to Kochi from March 2011

11th December 2010, www.island.lk

SriLankan Airlines will re-launch its services to Kochi from March 1 2011, increasing its growing portfolio of Indian destinations to seven, the national carrier announced last week. The resumption of flights links Colombo and Kerala’s commercial capital Kochi on all seven days of the week. The morning flight UL165/6 will depart Colombo at 0725 on Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays to reach Kochi at 0835. It leaves Kochi at 0925 and will arrive in Colombo at 1035.

The afternoon departure UL167/8 will leave Colombo at 1420 on Wednesdays, Saturdays and Sundays to reach Kochi at 1530 and leaves Kochi at 1620 and arrives in Colombo at 1730. Regional Manager Indian subcontinent for SriLankan Airlines, Lal Perera says, "With the resumption of our daily service to Kochi, we will aggressively promote leisure traffic to Colombo in addition to passengers travelling via CMB to Far East, Middle East and Europe "

With 2011 being declared as the year of "Visit Sri Lanka", the country opens its doors to tourists from Kochi and will also be showcased as a vibrant MICE destination.

The resumption of seven daily Colombo- Kochi flights will also add greater impetus to "Visit Sri Lanka 2011", when Sri Lanka opens her doors to an anticipated 750,000 foreign visitors. Up to October this year, a total of 95,579 Indian tourists have visited Sri Lanka , approximately 50% higher than the number of arrivals in 2009 which amounted to 64,447.

In 2011 alone, SriLankan Airlines will acquire seven new aircraft thus enabling it to fly to more cities in the Subcontinent, Middle East and Southeast Asia , and to also increase capacity to existing destinations in these regions.

SriLankan Airlines currently flies to 49 destinations in 31 countries. Kochi will be the second destination to be added to the airline’s network in 2011, with SriLankan scheduled to begin flights to Guangzhou in China next month, increasing its network to 51 destinations in 31 countries.