Jet Airways relief flights to Utaphao for stranded Bankok passengers

Just received an update from Jet Airways, indicating it has mounted relief operations for transporting stranded passengers at Bangkok, due to the political unrest in Thailand and consequent closure of Bangkok's Suvarnabhumi Airport.

Since Wednesday, 26 November, 2008, Jet Airways is operating relief flights into and out of Utaphao (U TaPao IATA:UTP), a naval base airport in Thailand, from its gateway points Mumbai and Kolkata.

Having deployed Boeing 737-800 aircraft for these operations, Jet Airways has uplifted close to 1000 passengers until date, and is currently reviewing the situation in order to plan subsequent flights, in the days to come.

The schedule of these relief flights is currently as follows:

9W 162 Dep Mumbai 1200hrs Arr Utaphao 1800hrs
9W 161 Dep Utaphao 2000hrs Arr Mumbai 2300hrs

9W 166 Dep Kolkata 1800hrs Arr Utaphao 2215hrs
9W 165 Dep Utaphao 0001hrs Arr Kolkata 0115hrs

(All times local)

For the convenience of its customers, Jet Airways' has also set up a coordination cell, for managing the bookings and handling of its stranded travellers. Customers wanting to travel out of Thailand may call the Jet Airways Bangkok city office to register themselves on telephone number +66 2 696 8980 (local dial 02 696 8980).

Jet Airways will advise all registered customers details of reporting time and place for its complimentary bus service to Utaphao airport, a 2 hour journey from Bangkok. Priority in confirming bookings will be given based on the customer's original flight date.

Based on the current flight schedules ex-Utaphao the bus timings are 2 pm for the Mumbai bound and 5 pm for the Kolkata bound customers respectively.

Jet Airways customers have the option of visiting the Jet Airways website for updated information.

In addition, Jet Airways has announced the waiver of cancellation/reissue charges on all confirmed tickets issued for travel into and out of Bangkok on Jet Airways flights up to the travel date of 05 December, 2008 and will allow involuntary rerouting without any penalties/additional charges for customers affected by its cancelled flights.

Jet Airways will further assist stranded customers in Bangkok who are able to travel out of airports such as Kuala Lumpur, Singapore or Hong Kong, by accepting their Bangkok -India flight coupons for use on those flights. However, any transfer costs from Bangkok to those airports will be at their own cost.