Veteran captain Milinda Ratnayake appointed Vice Chairman of Airport Authority

Clocking over 15,000 hours of flying passenger aircrafts, he has witnessed the operations of Air Ceylon, Air Lanka and SriLankan Airlines for over 40 years.

Besides his flying career, he also possesses a wealth of managerial experience overlooking Flight Operations and Service Delivery (managing security, cabin crew and ground handling).

He is the only Sri Lankan to be a representative of the Flight Operations Group with IATA. He is also an avid golfer. Capt. Ratnayake said he looked forward to bringing positive changes and improvements to the national airport.

Source-ft.lk

My former boss - flew with him a few times as well.

I always found him to be a fair and honest man - very approachable.

Of course Sri Lankans just had to tear him down as he was seen as too 'pro Expat'.

He was replaced with Druvi Perera - we've seen how that worked out!

Further, the Government has also decided to setup a dedicated domestic terminal in the Bandaranaike International Airport (BIA) for common use. Further, as there is no hangar space in BIA to allocate separate spaces for each operator, a common hangar space will be constructed for maintenance work and a separate hangar space for each operator in the Ratmalana Domestic Airport for night parking of aircrafts.*

The Cabinet also gave approval to allocate a portion of the current Apron D of BIA as a designated domestic apron to be utilised by all domestic flights. Further, self-handling by private operators will be permitted in domestic airports with BIA ground-handling and cargo charges set to undergo a downward revision for domestic carriers in consultation with SriLankan Airlines.*

Good move ! but Presently , cargo aircraft and business jets are using apron D for parking. So what does the airport authority going to do for that?

Already CMB is terribly busy for aircraft parking during the peak hours.



© Busologist

Ratmalana Airport to undergo expansion

The Ratmalana Airport is poised to undergo expansion, said Minister of Aviation Nimal Siripala de Silva addressing an event held in Colombo recently.

The minister said he managed to get about 25 acres of land in the Ratmalana airport released by paying Rs725 million to the air force to relocate their hangers elseware. But this will not fully solve the problem to help the private entrepreneurs who want to come into the Ratmalana Airport to commence aviation related businesses, as there was a huge demand, he said.

“We need to expand the Ratmalana Airport. We are spending about Rs one billion in installing the latest navigation equipment,” he said.


The Batticaloa airport has now been converted to a fully fledged civilian airport and Hingurakgoda, Palali and many other airports are in the process of being transformed into civil airports, he said. Since the country have come into a new era of development and in view of the large tourist influx particularly high end, and the inflow of investors, the aviation industry needs to flourish. And particularly since the era of air restriction is over the people must also reap the benefit of peace that has dawned in the country.

Therefore internal flight services, air transportation and flying schools are areas, that must undergo rapid development, he said.

Source-http://www.dailynews.lk/2018/06/29/b...ergo-expansion

The Cabinet of ministers had recently approved a proposal presented by Acting Transport and Civil Aviation Minister Ashoka Abeysinghe, to award the procurement of construction and maintenance of a hotel in a land owned by Airport and Aviation Services (Sri Lanka) Ltd., to Thilanka Hotel Pvt. Ltd. and Striders Corporation as recommended by the Cabinet-appointed Standing Procurement Committee, the latest cabinet decisions outlines.

Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe said that international flights are expected to resume operations at Mattala from the end of this year.

An Indian delegation is here to discuss a possible joint venture to operate Sri Lanka's loss-making Mattala Rajapaksa International Airport in Hambantota, the government said today.

India has agreed to form a joint venture with Sri Lanka to operate the country’s loss-making Mattala Rajapaksa International Airport in Hambantota, the Sri Lankan Civil Aviation Minister has told Parliament.

Air India is stuck with US$8 billion in debt and reported losses of almost $1.2 billion for the financial year ending March 2017.

Our neighbour unable fix its own national carrier, now they want to invest in our mattala airport, what a joke!!

Foolish decision by the government to handover the operations of our airport to our neighbour.

So what is the business strategy? Nothing.

Good Governance becoming Idiotic Governance.

Good move!

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SL, India 40-year joint venture for Mattala Airport
• India will control 70% while SL would have 30%
•Railway lines and highway to be extended to MRIA
•Minister assures no threat to national security
By Skandha Gunasekara

The Government will enter into a 40-year joint venture with India to salvage the loss-incurring Mattala Rajapaksa International Airport (MRIA), Parliament was told yesterday.

Minister of Transport and Civil Aviation Nimal Siripala De Silva, taking part in yesterday’s adjournment debate on the fate of the MRIA, asserted that there was no move to sell the Airport.

“The Mattala Airport has been incurring heavy losses since its inception. Its accumulated loss since it was opened in 2013 is Rs. 20 billion. We need to revitalise this dying Airport, but we cannot do it alone. We need investors. In 2016, I presented a Cabinet paper to this effect to seek international investors to revive the Airport. However, we didn’t receive any favourable response. Then, India offered to help us. So, we are now in discussion with India to enter into a joint venture to revive the MRIA,” the Minister said.

The Minister said that India would most likely control 70% while the Government would control 30%.

“India will control 70% of MRIA. We are still in discussion regarding the conditions of the joint venture. We still need to decide on matters such as future investments.”

Dismissing opposition claims that the deal may result in a threat to national security, the Minister said that India would have no say in security matters.

“All security matters will be dealt by Sri Lanka. Even the air traffic controller will be under us,” he said, adding that 70% of losses incurred by the Airport would be borne by India through the joint venture.

In addition, the Minister noted that plans were underway to extend both the railway lines and the highway up to MRIA.

“Once the railway lines and the highway are connected to the Airport, both tourism and trade can be increased,” Minister De Silva said.

The adjournment motion was submitted by Joint Opposition MP Kanaka Herath.

MP Herath, opening the debate, charged that the Government was planning to sell MRIA to India.

“If we sell this Airport, it will be detrimental to our country. We shouldn’t be selling our national assets. Plus, selling it to India will be a threat to our national security,” MP Herath said.

Not defending anyone but this could be actually one of their better decisions given how much of a white elephant Mattala is. India pays 70% of the debt back and its unlikely to be properly developed (unlike if the Chinese buy/lease it). As such BIA won't face competition from a second airport. The money received from India could also be used to develop BIA.

Also given that our guys are unable to fix UL, going by your logic they also shouldn't manage Mattala.

More than 90 per cent airports run by the state-owned agency Airports Authority of India (AAI) are running into losses, according to government data. In 2016-2017, the AAI could generate revenue from only eight of the total 102 airports it manages in the country. Delhi’s Safdarjung Airport, which is occasionally used for VVIP chopper flights, incurred the maximum losses of over Rs 92 crore followed by airports at Amritsar and Bhopal which saw losses of Rs 50.52 crore and Rs 49.53 crore respectively.



Our Government making the wrong move by handing over operations of MRIA to AAI and it will create more problems.

People need to understand a few things

- The country is bankrupt. They are unable to cover the loan costs on about $12 Billion of debt.

- The IMF has had to step in to prevent a complete Economic Collapse. The IMF is running the country - you won't find any Politician that will admit this.

- The IMF has told the GOSL to sell or close down various SOEs including this airport. This is a condition of getting further money from the IMF.

- The GOSL has no choice in the matter.



There are people responsible for this situation - One man and his Hubris has destroyed the country. The reason these people want to get back in power is to prevent any investigations or legal action ever seeing the light of day.

I would encourage people to do their own research - including the excellent NY Times article which appears to be 100% accurate.

Never believe anything until it has been officially denied!

Sri Lanka is going to get a third International Airport that will be contructed in Hingurukgoda as per the Master Plan that had been drawn up for the development of Trincomalee, which was handed over to to Prime Ministed Ranil Wickremesinghe by Singaporean Consultancy group Surbana Jurong at Temple Tree.



Should Sri Lanka contruct an seperate International in Hingurukgoda instead of developing the Colombo Bandaranaike International Airport which urgently needs the terminal expansion. Why Sri Lanka didn't want to develop the existing the Trincomalee airport instead of building the new airport from the scratch?