Bhubaneswar–Rourkela first flight to take off tomorrow

The much awaited flight operations from Rourkela airport in Odisha is finally going to begin from Saturday (January 7) with the aerodrome set to receive its first flight from Bhubaneswar tomorrow.

While Civil Aviation Minister, Jyotiraditya Scindia will inaugurate the service through video conferencing, Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik will flag off the first flight from Biju Patnaik International Airport in Bhubaneswar at 10:45 am tomorrow.

With this, Rourkela has been added to the airports map as the fourth one in Odisha after Bhubaneswar, Jharsuguda and Jeypore.

As per reports, an Alliance Air aircraft will operate the flight service between Bhubaneswar and Rourkela with a capacity of 72 passengers.

Following the inauguration, routine flight services will start from January 12.

An ATR-72 aircraft of Alliance Air will take off from Bhubaneswar at 02:55 pm everyday and arrive at Rourkela at 03:50 pm. On its return journey the flight will take off from Rourkela at 04:15 pm and arrive in Bhubaneswar at 05:10 pm.

As far as the fare is concerned, the Bhubaneswar – Rourkela fare has been set at Rs 2803 and the return fare is priced at Rs 2721.

Speaking to OTV, BPIA Director, Prasanna Pradhan said, “This is a long standing demand of the people of Odisha to connect Bhubaneswar with Rourkela by air. The route has been awarded to Alliance Air under the RCS scheme.”

“Though the initial service is between Bhubaneswar and Rourkela, the slot allocation for Alliance Air has been made till Kolkata. May be after the Hockey World Cup, they will begin Rourkela-Kolkata operations,” said, Pradhan.

(Reported By Kapilendra Pradhan, OTV)