The Platov International Airport (member of the Airports of Regions Holding) has started servicing scheduled international transfer flights of the Pobeda Airline with a record-breaking time slot of 50 minutes. The new airport of Rostov-on-Don has therefore met a request of a low-cost air carrier for reduction of the ground service time.
– The infrastructure of the new airport has been developed subject to specific features of servicing transfer flights, particularly transfers from a Russian to an international flight and vice versa with the most complicated processes, says Sergei Krasnov, the Executive Director of the Platov Airport. – The transfer infrastructure makes it possible for us to improve operational activity and reduce the turnaround time for aircraft servicing.
The turnaround time of 50 minutes (from setting the airplane on the parking area and until taxiing starts) is the minimal turnaround time to make preparation of an international flight with transfer passengers for departure. The share of transfer passengers on Rostov flights of Pobeda makes up to 53%. Several process operations are taking place during 50 minutes at present: debarkation/embarkation of passengers, refueling, extra check of the transfer baggage and transfer passengers and border and customs check of the aircraft and the crew.
To recap, the Pobeda low-cost air carrier is making Moscow-Rostov-on-Don-Tbilisi transfer flights and at the end of May will start transportation to two new destinations of Gumri and Batumi also with the transfer via Platov. Airline services are among the most popular with Rostov residents, as evidenced by a high passenger seat occupancy factor and a share of passengers in the overall passenger traffic of the airport: Pobeda Airline was second by the number of passengers carried from Platov as of 2017 year-end.