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BY A CORRESPONDENT March 24: When
the domestic aviation sector hots up, can cargo
carriers be far behind? The South-based Crescent
Air Cargo Services Pvt Ltd, a new dedicated cargo
airline company, is planning to take off by
April-end. The company announced this at a press
conference in Chennai on Wednesday.
Backed by three Fokker F50s, Crescent Air Cargo
will operate in key domestic sectors like
Chennai-Bangalore, Mumbai-Bangalore-Chennai,
Chennai-Hyderabad-Chennai and Mumbai-Delhi-Mumbai
sectors.
Promoted by a small team of entrepreneurs, the Rs
20-crore Crescent Air Cargo also has plans to add
two more F50 planes and fly on the Chennai-Colombo
and Chennai-Male sectors in May-June, said Captain
Deepak Parasuraman, Crescent MD.
"We will be acquiring wide-bodied jets for the
international operations within a year", he added.
In the first year of operations, Crescent Air
Cargo is targeting a turnover of Rs 100 crore. "We
plan to move 20,000 tonnes of cargo through 2,544
flights in the first year", he said. Crescent Air
will fly courier cargo by night and high-value and
perishable cargo by day.
Crescent Air Cargo is targeting Chinese and West
Asian cargo markets and is operating feeder
services for international carriers.
The company expects that operating a cargo service
from Chennai to Colombo, the air freight for
cargoes to European cities would be substantially
lower than the freight charges from Mumbai. The
company hopes to cash in on this.
Crescent Air Cargo has also tied up with Malaysian
Airlines for providing IT assistance on a
whole-time basis for flight operations and
training of crew. For engineering support, the
company has entered into a 'continued
airworthiness support agreement', with Fokker
Services Asia, Singapore.
BY A CORRESPONDENT
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