Emirates will be using only B777-300/300ER services to Colombo from 26-Oct-14.

Air Costa for completing one successful year in Indian Aviation Industry. Last year on this very same day Air Costa initiated flying, currently Air Costa is the only airline in India operating a fleet from the Brazilian manufacturer "Embraer" - fleet includes Embraer E-170 and E-190. This airline, promoted by Lingamaneni Estates Private Limited (LEPL), is headquartered in Vijayawada.

In picture: Air Costa Embraer190 VT-LBR at Bangalore Intl. Airport.

Spotted by: Nitin Nair

Link:https://www.flickr.com/photos/nitinmnair/14283830700/

Today Qantas to operate one-off charter service to Colombo. Looking forward to see the picture of VH-OEB from Colombo. Has Qantas visited Colombo in the past?

Flight Tracker : http://fr.flightaware.com/live/flight/QFA6034

QANTAS B747-400 VH-OEB Departs on Captain’s Choice RTW Tour.

October 16, 2014

QANTAS Boeing 747-48E VH-OEB departed Sydney for a 21 day Captain’s Choice round the world tour today, initially routing Sydney – Colombo as QF6034. The complete route is Sydney – Colombo – Samarkand – Tel Aviv – Marrakech – Azores – Antigua – San Francisco – Sydney.

source : http://www.theqantassource.com/ and shanaka/flylanka

Woah!!

WOW! Do you think this could lead to potentially permanent flights?

I believe Qantus did a flight from Perth to Colombo in the 1940s.

Hi flylanka, Do you think it will work if Qantas operate on SYD-SIN-CMB onboard A333 ?

I think that this could be a profitable route in the future, particularly if Qantas could get rights to carry passengers between, say, BKK or SIN and CMB. With the large numbers of Sri Lankans already living in Australia, combined with the popularity of routes between SIN/BKK and Colombo, I think they could definitely make it work. With UL now being a OneWorld member, they could also turn this into an opportunity for a codeshare. I have heard rumors of UL starting a route to Melbourne potentially

I think Syd Sin Cmb will be a good move to QF but SQ/UL might have problems!!

Heya all, newbie here
Call me Jish, if you wish
I have been staying in Colombo for the past 3 years, and I'm a big time aviation-Formula One-heavy metal music nut.
I would like to share some pictures from my recent Paris school trip, flew on 4R-ALC and 4R-ALG.
UL563 CMB-CDG was on ALC:










And some of the return flight, UL564 on 4R-ALG:











I have posted a detailed trip report here. Warning, overloaded with pictures!
Thank you for accepting me into your forum, I'm sure I'll love contributing here!

Regards
Jish

Welcome to Our Forum Jish.

Waiting see more pictures from the trip report.

Wow nice pictures Jish! It's nice to have you in our Air Sri Lanka forum!

When did you fly? Could you please tell me about your experience on flying onboard SriLankan Airlines. Loved to know about the Passenger Load Factor, IFE performance, Cabin Crew service, Cabin cleanliness, ground staff performance, flight on-time performance etc...

Love to see your other plane spotting pictures from Colombo Airport soon.

Nice to see Korean Air in the picture. Just to confirm is this picture taken at Colombo CMB? What was the time when you were taking this picture?

Hello there Srilankan1! Its great to be a part of your forum
You can find more pictures from the flight to Paris here: http://airlinersindia.s4.bizhat.com/...rsindia#138018
And the return flight here: http://airlinersindia.s4.bizhat.com/...rsindia#138275
I'm sorry I cannot type out a full TR here, going by the trends in this thread, it seems that the flights are summarized rather than a full trip report. But if you want a full detailed TR from me, do let me know!

Banu, I have written those in the links posted, but I shall summarize it for you here:
UL563 CMB-CDG
27th June 2014
It was a decent experience, in fact much better than what I expected! UL is no doubt a hidden jewel in South Asia, and hopefully their induction into Oneworld will help them a lot. If there is anything I have to complain on this flight: its the food, which was not a complete disaster, but slightly below par. The first meal was less in quantity, the second meal (egg especially) did feel a bit undercooked. Also, the washroom was clean in the first few hours of the flight, towards the end, it was a complete mess. Pictures are in the link..
Loads were quite low on this flight, about 65%..in fact so low that I changed my seat no less than 7 times during the flight! IFE screens were dead, to be frank. Only a handful here and there would show movies, the others would show the flight information (enough for me to survive!). Group check in was very slow, but that was due to a family who got stuck for a long time, the agent made sure we were fast tracked to check in, as a group. The crew is what won my lauds - a fantastic crew, with whom I spent one and a half of the 10 hours chatting away with!

Return UL564 CDG-CMB
6th July 2014
Check in lady was quite weird :/ but since she wasn't from UL, I shall skip this. Full loads this flight, not a single spare seat available. Food was good, but the choices ran out and I did not get my choice of meal in one of the meals. Cabin and washroom was very clean throughout the whole flight, and another set of fantastic crew members! Sure, I did not have any conversations with them because of the full flight, but they had the warmth, the dedication and professionalism of a 5* airline, no doubt. IFE worked this time, but the view outside the window is my form of entertainment Departed 45 minutes later, and reached about 10 minutes late due to rerouting (congestion over Middle East, I've explained this in the second link)

This is just a slim summary of the flights, there is more in the link(s)!

TO answer your question, yes that KE bird has been taken in Colombo, at 0451 hours. So that means the bird had just come in from ICN, and would later depart to MLE.

Regards
Jish

Sri Lanka (127) Colombo Airport by Greg McCann, on Flickr

Hey all
I'll be posting some pictures from my recent A380-hunting trip to Hong Kong.
prior to this, I attempted to get on the A380 thrice before (JNB-DXB got downgraded due to the wing cracks, DXB-JED-DXB never seemed realistic, and a KUL-HKG-KUL was booked, but it got downgraded again, but cancelled that trip as a whole).

Frustrated by all this, I decided to convince my parents to go to Hong Kong on what is one of the world's leading carriers: Singapore Airlines, while also catching their A380 on the popular SIN-HKG-SIN route. Along with this, we also decided to go to Taipei in Taiwan.
Once again, I will post links to ALL parts of the long TR, but I'll write something brief about the CMB-SIN-CMB segments

Part 1 - Spotting in Negombo, pics of a UL A343 flight (MAA-CMB), SQ469 A333 to SIN and SQ856 A380 to HKG: http://airlinersindia.s4.bizhat.com/...ic.php?t=13877
Part 2 - Non aviation pics, Hong Kong: http://airlinersindia.s4.bizhat.com/...ic.php?t=13890
Part 3 - To Taipei on the RARE MD90, operated by EVA Air: http://airlinersindia.s4.bizhat.com/...ic.php?t=13916
Part 4 - Non aviation pics, Taipei: http://airlinersindia.s4.bizhat.com/...ic.php?t=13939
Part 5 - Equivalent of the Japanese Shinkansen, the Taiwan High Speed Rail: http://airlinersindia.s4.bizhat.com/...=140245#140245
Part 6 - Back to Hong Kong on the ULTRA RARE Boeing 747-400 Combi, operated by EVA Air: http://airlinersindia.s4.bizhat.com/...ic.php?t=13969
Part 7 - Heading home, via SIN on the A380: http://airlinersindia.s4.bizhat.com/...ic.php?t=13988
Part 8 - The final flight back home, the SQ A333: http://airlinersindia.s4.bizhat.com/...opic13999.html
In addition, I also took plenty of pictures of planes, 4 fantastic sessions of plane spotting, including one from my hotel room!
Spotting part 1 - http://airlinersindia.s4.bizhat.com/...opic13903.html
Spotting part 2 - http://airlinersindia.s4.bizhat.com/...opic13984.html
(Psst - there are pictures of a UL A332 over there!)

Anyways, on to the flights.
SQ469 on 20th August 2014, operated by 9V-STV an Airbus A330-343E.







My expectations were quite high, and SQ met those. Right from the online booking, up until arrival into SIN. The SIN ground staff was a bit rude as you'll read, but other than that, they were fantastic. Comfy seats, delicious food, great IFE content (slight lag was there), awesome beverage selection and wonderful crew. Other than the slow IFE, the washroom was a bit on the dirty side. Considering the fact that an FA had just cleaned it before I used it, this was not up to the mark. Full flight, and everything was on time. The mammoth flight followed, and boy was I impressed!
I found a UL A320 stalking me while on the mammoth:


The return flight was no different, perhaps the best of them all? Toilet was stinky stinky stinky. And that stench was there just a few minutes after I boarded, rather a few seconds after! Other than that, FANTASTIC crew, out of this world food, exceptional service, on time = MIND BLOWN!
This flight was not as full as the outbound, but perhaps SQ had enough of passengers on the flight to keep them happy! Just 4 or 5 seats empty in my section of Economy. I've flown into SIN thrice on 3 airlines: Emirates, Cathay Pacific and now Singapore Airlines. With time, I shall post mini TRs of the other two airlines. SQ were clearly in a different class. I was very sleepy so I did not pick up much....
This flight was operated on the 26th August 2014 by 9V-STS.






I will be on my first A340 flight this Friday (24th October), on my way to Bengaluru.
I hope to share some positive experiences with you all!

Regards
Jish