Oman Air starts third daily flight to Mumbai

Oman Air has launched a third daily flight on its popular Muscat to Mumbai route from August 1. The two-hour 50 minute flight departs Muscat at 10.40pm and arrives in Mumbai at 3am. The return flight leaves Mumbai at 4.05am and reaches Muscat at 5.15am. Oman Air also connects Doha and Muscat.Oman Air already has two daily return flights between Muscat and Mumbai – the outgoing flights depart Muscat at 1.20am and 9am, arriving in Mumbai at 5.40am and 1.20pm, respectively.The returning flights leave Mumbai at 4.15pm and 6.55am, reaching Muscat at 5.30pm and 8.10am.The new time slot is expected to prove popular, especially with business travellers who can now take an evening flight and reach their destination early the next morning. Many convenient connections are also on offer for GCC travellers.Mumbai, the largest city in India, is also the financial, commercial and entertainment capital. Drawing around 5mn visitors a year, the city is consistently in high demand among Oman Air guests, especially those from Oman’s large Indian expatriate community.The new flight is the latest move in Oman Air’s ambitious and dynamic programme of fleet and network expansion and boosts Oman’s connection to India, which is an important trade partner for the Sultanate.Oman Air first launched flights to India in the 1990s and the demand for seats has grown exponentially amongst both business and leisure passengers, not only increasing tourism traffic and revenue but also promoting vital trade agreements between the two countries.The airline is growing its weekly capacity to India with frequencies increasing on five of the airline’s eleven key Indian destinations. Mumbai, Delhi and Hyderabad increase from twice daily to three times daily.Calicut increases from once daily to three times daily and Lucknow increases from once daily to twice daily.This latest addition from Mumbai to Muscat increases the overall weekly frequency of flights to India from 154 to 161.In addition, towards the beginning of the year the airline launched direct daily flights between Salalah and Calicut.This growth in capacity follows the revised Air Services agreement between the Government of Oman and India in December 2016, when the number of weekly seats was increased to 27,405 seats for both countries, compared to 21,145 seats in the previous agreement, an increase of 6,258 seats per week.Abdulrahman al-Busaidy, deputy CEO and chief commercial officer of Oman Air, said: “We are extremely happy to announce this new service between Muscat and Mumbai. The addition of this flight is part of our wider commitment to the Indian market. India is a key destination for Oman Air and the demand for all 11 of our Indian destinations has always been high. We are sure this new service will prove just as popular as our other Indian routes.”