By IANS
Hyderabad : Hyderabad’s new international airport is all set to receive its first commercial flights as part of test operations Tuesday.
The GMR Hyderabad International Airport Limited (GHIAL) announced that a Kingfisher Airlines A320 and a Boeing 747 of Jet Airways will land on the runway at Rajiv Gandhi International Airport at Shamshabad, about 25 km from the city.
GHAIL Friday announced that the aircrafts with selected invitees and VIPs would take off from the existing airport at Begumpet in the heart of the city for Mumbai Tuesday morning. The flights will then take off for the new airport at Shamshabad at 2 p.m.
The Kingfisher flight will be the first to touch down on the runway at 4.10 p.m. while the Jet Airways flight will land 15 minutes later.
Union Minister for Civil Aviation Praful Patel and Chief Minister Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy will receive the passengers on the tarmac.
“These will be the first commercial flights to land at the airport,” said a GHIAL official.
The authorities have already tested the facilities with smaller aircraft. With the landing and take-off of commercial flights, the facilities will prove their readiness for commercial operations from March 16.
United Progressive Alliance (UPA) chairperson Sonia Gandhi will formally inaugurate the airport March 14. All flights to the existing airport will be diverted to the new airport from the early hours of March 16.
The Rs.24.78 billion ($600 million) airport incorporates the best of facilities at Oslo, Hong Kong, Kuala Lumpur and Singapore airports and promises to take Indian airports to a new level.
GHIAL has already completed 96 percent of the work and the remaining will be over before the end of February. The installation and testing of equipments in the 70-metre-tall Air Traffic Control (ATC) tower has already been completed.
GHIAL is a joint venture of the GMR Group (63 percent), Malaysia Airports Holding Berhad (11 percent), Airports Authority of India (13 percent) and the Andhra Pradesh government (13 percent).
In its initial phase, the airport will be capable of handling 12 million passengers and more than 100,000 tonnes of cargo per annum. The full capacity of the new airport is over 40 million passengers and one million tonnes of cargo in a year.
The 4,260-metre-long runway, the longest in South Asia, is A380 aircraft compatible.