Garuda Opens New Routes in Eastern Indonesia
27 March 2014 12:10 WIB
TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - Garuda Indonesia CEO Emirsyah Satar said to open new routes to improve the eastern Indonesia's connectivity and tourism development sector.
"We will add more routes from 72 to 131 to eastern Indonesia by 2020," Emir said yesterday. The opening of new routes also consider the economic potential of the cities in eastern Indonesia.
In June 2014, Garuda will open routes that connect the north corridor, which is Denpasar-Manado. Other routes will also be opened such as to Mamuju, Pomala, Luwuk, Palopo, Baubau, Langgur, Kaimana, Putussibau and Pangkalan Bun.
In Papua region, cities that will be connected in the new routes in December 2014 are Sorong, Manokwari and Merauke.
Garuda Indonesia will use ATR-72 aircrafts for the new routes. It is also planning on opening international routes from Makassar to Jedda with transit in Kualanamu Airport, North Sumatra.
Garuda is currently launching sub-brands Garuda Indonesia Explore and Explore Jet that fly around small cities in eastern Indonesia such as Makassar, Sorong, Manokwari and Jayapura. The planes are CRJ100 NextGen with 96-passenger capacity (12 for business class and 84 for economic class).
Other cities like Denpasar, Bima, Lombok, Labuhan Bajo and Ende use ATR-72 with the capacity of 70 passengers.
NURUL MAHMUDAH
