IndiGo – India’s largest carrier by fleet and domestic market share will launch flights to Kurnool (IATA: KJB) from March 28, 2021. The airline will connect Kurnool to Bengaluru, Visakhapatnam and Chennai, all under the Regional Connectivity Scheme (RCS) – UDAN (Ude Desh ka Aam Nagrik). The airport was included in UDAN 4.0. Flights are expected to be on sale from later today.
Network Thoughts records show that this would be the 106th airport which will be operational in the country. This will be the sixth operational airport in the state of Andhra Pradesh – with the other five being Visakhapatnam, Vijaywada, Tirupati, Kadapa and Rajahmundry.
6E7911 BLR0905 – 1010KJB
6E7914 KJB1515 – 1625BLR
6E7913 VTZ1300 – 1455KJB
6E7912 KJB1030 – 1240VTZ
6E7915 MAA1450 – 1610KJB
6E7916 KJB1630 – 1750MAA
The flights to Kurnool from Bengaluru and Visakhapatnam will operate on Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays while the flights between Chennai and Kurnool will operate on Tuesdays, Thursdays, Saturdays and Sundays.
Kurnool airport is being setup about 35 kilometres South-East of the city. As of today, the nearest airport is Hyderabad which is over 200 kms away. Kurnool has gained importance since the state of Telangana was carved out in 2014 from Andhra Pradesh. With the state’s capital Hyderabad now part of Telangana, Andhra Pradesh has seen flip-flops on selection of capital city. As it stands today the state is to have three capitals with the executive capital being Visakhapatnam, the legislative capital being Amaravati – the city which is being newly built and the judicial capital being Kurnool. While Vizag has its own airport and a new Greenfield airport is under construction, Amaravati is serviced by Vijayawada. Kurnool was the only capital which was without air connectivity.
The city lies on the Hyderabad – Bengaluru highway and is fifth largest by population in the state of Andhra Pradesh.
Network Thoughts
Kurnool is one of the seven new stations which IndiGo is starting until end of May this year. The airline has been on a station starting spree since the time the airline started inducting the ATR aircraft. With the operations under RCS-UDAN, the less than optimal frequency will not be an issue. With a large hub at Bengaluru which has many inbound red eye flights, the morning departure to Kurnool will see connectivity from multiple other places across the country like Mumbai, Pune, Ahmedabad, Delhi, Kochi, Jaipur, Kolkata amongst others.
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