Aerospace Diary

Neelam Mathews Oct 31, 2012 Jet Airways may soon be moving its international operations to Munich, Aerospace Diary learns. While  Brussels Airport was geared to handle 6 Jet flights a day with seamless activity, the carrier's expansion plans for adding more flights connecting Bangalore, Hyderabad and perhaps Chicago and Washington DC, will make the terminal small for handling the six existing plus four proposed flights, it is learnt. We hear that most of the senior managers have not been informed about the change. Since Munich is a busy airport, Jet will face considerable competition there as Brussels was a virtual monopoly. For example, Chennai-Brussels-JFK will now be MAA-MRU-JFK. "Now Jet cannot use 332s. Compare that to Lufthansa's 380... which will at a lower cost...Hence they should add capacity to BRU," an analyst says. "They (Jet)  should have connected to further points long ago..... Since 2007 they have been operating the same flights...

Neelam Mathews Sept 25, 2012 We hear that given the good business on the Brussels route, Jet Airways may be looking to reconfigure an A330 (VT-JWM) from a 1-1-1   in Business Class to a 1-2-1 config and additional rows in economy. The remaining A330s might also be reconfigured. Not great news for passengers though who'll be packed more than usual! We are also hearing that Jet’s base will not be shifted to Munich as reported by some newspapers. There will just be a flight from Mumbai to Frankfurt and one to Munich. It is also believed that Lufthansa wants a codeshare with Jet in India the way Jet wants it for its operations in Europe. “Jet will never join an alliance,” an official tells us. One would be inclined to say: “Never say never,” but  increasingly, many in the business are following the Emirates philosophy of alignments but not alliances. Here's a video on the  recent partnership  with OneWorld partner, Qantas -