Thai Air clips its Ctg service, reduces Dhk-Bangkok flights

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A Z M Anas
Thai Airways has suspended its Bangkok services to the port city of Chittagong and reduced flights between Dhaka and the capital of Thailand, in a major cutback in the airline's capacity in Bangladesh, officials said Sunday.
Thailand's national carrier has stopped passenger flights to and from Chittagong since November 25 when anti-government protesters occupied Suvarnabhumi Airport.
The national carrier of the South East Asian nation also reduced the number of weekly flights by two between Dhaka and Bangkok, citing a drop-off in air travellers, they said. The Bangkok-based carrier operated seven flights a week on the busy route.
"The phenomenon is worldwide -- travelers are also buffeted by the economic downturn,' a senior official at Thai Airways in Dhaka told the FE.
Our capacity reduction is simply due to a slump in business. The traffic of passengers on the country's majority of the routes is showing signs of downturn. Only the Middle-eastern routes are still unhurt, thanks to the increasing labour traffic," the official, who spoke on condition that he would not be identified, said.
The airline's decision comes at a time when the global financial tsunami takes its cruel toll on international aviation business.
He would not disclose the percentage of decline in passengers traveling by Thai Airways, but said before the unrest the flight occupancy rate was close to 70 per cent.
Aviation analysts say the Thai and other airlines operating on the Dhaka-Bangkok route survive mainly on deep-pocketed businessmen and medical tourists.
International Air Transport Association (IATA), the Geneva-based industry lobby, has estimated that passenger air traffic will drop to 3.0 per cent in 2009, the first year-over-year drop-off in traffic since 2001, after the September 11 terrorist attacks on the US.
Aviation industry insiders say the airline authority is unlikely to revive the Chittagong-Bangkok-Chittagong route anymore as the route is proved commercially unviable. The Thai Airline started its Bangkok services to the port city of Chittagong in 2002, operating three weekly flights.
But the airline official dismissed the notion that the airline would drop the Chittagong-Bangkok route, saying that the rumour is 'not true at all."
He, however, acknowledged that the resumption of flight operations from and to Shah Amanat International Airport and frequency hike at Zia International Airport by the airline would be contingent on two factors --political stability in Bangladesh and Thailand and resurgence in air travel.
Thai Airways, which has served the Bangladesh market since 1965, is one of the oldest foreign carriers out of 20 operating in the country. Foreign airlines have garnered roughly 80 per cent of the country's growing aviation market, beating out its local rivals including Biman.
The Thai Airways official said there is "little possibility" of increasing frequency before political situations in Bangladesh and Thailand are back to normal.
MA Muhaimin Saleh, president of Association of Travel Agents of Bangladesh (ATAB), said the number of air travelers from Dhaka has dropped as the global financial meltdown has weighed on travellers' movement.
"Airlines are really scrambling to stay afloat, even if jet fuel prices are taking a plunge. Only Middle Eastern carriers are faring well, relying heavily on Bangladeshi migrant workers," the ATAB chief said.
British Airways, the UK's national carrier, last month announced that it would drop its Dhaka services to London from March next on commercial grounds.