Flight Delays Expected in Homecoming Season Due to Full Schedule
13 June 2018 21:16 WIB
TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - The Ministry of Transportation asserted that it has received the report of several airlines that will possibly experience delays during the 2018 Eid`s homecoming. The ministry sees that the situation is understandable following the significant increase of flights schedules.
“There are currently 14 airlines that serve flights scheduled in the Eid's homecoming season. The on-time performance (OTP) is around 90 percent, but there are several problems that have caused the OTP to drop to 75 percent,” said Agus Santoso, Director General of Air Transportation on Wednesday, June 13.
Read: Garuda Predicts Peak of Homecoming Flow on June 10 to 13
Furthermore, Agus explained that the flight delay was partially caused by requests on prime time slots by several airlines. The high demand on the prime time slots can be caused by the airliner’s consideration of the availability of transportation to and from the airport for its customers.
“If we spread it outside of the prime time, airlines would object that since it would be too late at night for their passengers to arrive at airports, which means the lack of transportation. This has made several airlines delay their flight,” said Agus.
To make sure that there are not too many delays, Agus said that the ministry has introduced several policies, such as by halting the construction of several runway overlay projects on June 7-24 to give way to the congested flight schedules.
The Transportation Ministry has also asked several airports such as in Semarang and Surabaya, to operate 24-hours throughout the Eid's homecoming season so that the additional flights can be accommodated.
Caesar Akbar