Tourist Season kicks off in Goa

The much awaited-first two charter flights of the tourist season, carrying 345 and 200 passengers from United Kingdom arrived at Dabolim airport by Monarch Airlines today.

The first flight landed at 11.30 a.m, while the other one landed at 4.30 p.m. Monarch Airlines flights will arrive at Dabolim airport only on Sundays and by the end of this month there are more than 1,500 tourists are expected to arrive in Goa.

The station manager of Monarch Airlines, Mr Subhash Phegade informed that this year about 4 lakh tourist are expected to arrive in Goa by charter flights. He further said that last year around 3 lakh tourists had come.

Mr Phegade further stated that there are about 800 charter flights from various airlines all over the world including Monarch Airlines, First Choice Airways, Finn Air, Nova Air, My Travels Airlines, Thomson Airlines, Condore Airlines, Transvia Airlines, Trans Airlines, Vim Air besides others will make its regular trips to Goa during this tourist season.

Mr Phegade also stated that in all 17 tour operators are involved in the service of the charter tourists arriving in Goa. He also stated, “As the charter tourists flow in Goa would be higher than last year, they have deployed additional 100 loaders and 50 commercial staff to give better service to the tourists.”

He also informed that the tourist season would actually begin from November 1 with other charter flights arriving in Goa. The charter tourist season (arrival of charter flights) would conclude on May 2, 2007.

The airport authorities have made suitable arrangements at Dabolim airport from the security point of view. Arrangements for 100 per cent search operations by hand, incase the X-ray machines failure at international terminal due to technical snag, have also been made.

Mr Phegade lamented that with the outbreak of dengue cases in India some tourists were hesitating to visit in India and as such the flow of tourists may get affected.