After 10 years of break, Biman Bangladesh Airlines started flight operation between Dhaka and Frankfurt, a route which was incurring losses for the national flag carrier.
A brand new Boeing 777-300 aircraft left Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport yesterday for Frankfurt of Germany.
Biman Bangladesh Airlines will initially operate two flights a week on Monday and Friday in the route with a brief stop at Rome-Fumicino.
“Boeing 777-300 flight left Hazrat Shahjalal with a good number of passengers on board,” said Motahar Hossein, General Manager (central control) of Biman.
The aircraft has 384 economy and 35 business class seats. Of them, 248 economy class seats and 34 business class were purchased for Rome and Frankfurt. Biman first brought the Dhaka-Frankfurt route within its network in 1986 and then went to suspension as it was incurring losses.
According to the sources concerned, the flights could draw very poor numbers of passengers, which forced the authorities to stop the operation in the route.
Although it was a loss-making route, the authorities didn’t conduct any market survey before going into resumption, they said.
“No prior survey was initiated, but they reopened it. We don’t know if it would make profit or incur loss again,” an official told the Dhaka Tribune.
But Biman, in a press release, claimed that the flight operation was suspended due to shortage of aircrafts.
The flag carrier operates flights in more 18 destinations overseas.
