Virus scare: Dip in fliers to Singapore from Kovai

The passenger traffic between Singapore and Coimbatore has nosedived to 50 per cent over the last one week. In the absence of a direct flight service to China, which has been reeling under severe life loss due to the deadly disease, the passengers from there reach Singapore and take a flightto Coimbatore.

Due to declining passenger movement, Scoot, the low-cost service of the Singapore Airlines (SIA) Group, which commenced its operations on the Coimbatore-Singapore route from October last year, has been flying almost half empty over the lastone week.

“Of the total 150 seats in the aircraft, only 70 to 80 passengers are now flying by the flight to Coimbatore from Singapore. Passenger patronage in the flight back to Singapore has also come down drastically,” said a staff of the airline.   

In the initial weeks of its operation in Coimbatore, the daily service carrier registered over 90 per cent passenger movement. And the passenger traffic continued to be good until the outbreak of corona.  

Echoing a similar trend, the Air India Express, which has been operating flight service between Coimbatore and Singapore, too has started witnessing lower passenger traffic between the two destinations.

As per schedule, the carrier was operated to Coimbatore on Wednesday, Friday and Sundays from Singapore. Thereafter from Coimbatore, the flight would take off to Delhi. The same carrier, on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday was operated to Coimbatore from Delhi and thento Singapore.

An airport official said that the service has been suspended temporarily due to declining passenger traffic between the two destinations. “The operations will be suspended from March 1. Instead, a new service will be commenced between Coimbatore and Thiruvananthapuram,”said the official.  

However, the time and fare of the new services is yet to be decided. The officials hoped that the new service between Coimbatore and Thiruvananthapuram, being introduced newly, may witness goodpassenger patronage.

Many tourists, who fly to Singapore, have put on hold their plans following the corona scare. “We were planning to visit Singapore with our family for this summer vacation, but have changed plans to avoid risks following corona outbreak,” said S Venkatesh, a realtor from Coimbatore.