jet blue: November 2009

jet airways
Jet Airways chose Brussels Airport (voted Best Airport in Europe in 2006 by the Airport Council) as its European hub for developing its international network to Europe and America. This decision will have a tremendous impact on the activities in and around the airport: the processing of operations, a great influx of transfer passengers, interconnectivity as well as the creation of additional job opportunities. Brussels Airport, Jet Airways and code share partner Brussels Airlines have entered into a close cooperation to offer a transfer product that will make Brussels Airport the main European hub, thus interconnecting the large regions of the world, Europe, the United States, Canada, Asia and Africa.

Partners
Jet Airways is the largest private airline in India. Jet Airways chose Brussels Airport – located at the heart of Europe – as its European hub. Jet Airways opted to settle in Brussels because the airport operates highly efficiently, has not yet reached its maximum capacity and therefore offers extension possibilities, it is also comfortable and is manned by friendly and multilingual personnel. Jet Airways aims to open up India with flights to Delhi and Mumbai from Brussels. In the short term a string of Indian destinations will be added. Jet Airways thus expands its offer at Brussels Airport while setting new standards for the airline sector.

Brussels Airport guarantees the most efficient transfer experience in Europe: luggage handling is swift and accurate, transfer passengers are welcomed in great comfort, flights take off on time. The individual service to passengers is taken to a higher level and the airport is investing in next generation passenger facilities and related infrastructure.

Brussels Airlines guarantees regular and punctual connections from and to 22 European cities (including France, Germany, Spain, Italy, Scandinavia and Eastern Europe). The departure times of Brussels Airlines’ flights to Africa connect perfectly with the flight schedules of Jet Airways, thus allowing efficient and comfortable connections to these destinations.

Brussels Airlines is the code share partner of Jet Airways for flights to India. Brussels Airlines and Jet Airways will open up the gateway to India for Belgian, European and African passengers via Brussels Airport.

Objective: a unique and unequalled transfer experience

Frequent flyers often complain that airports are bursting at the seams, that the service level is dropping and leads to unnecessary and considerable time loss and stress. Brussels Airport, Brussels Airlines and Jet Airways have set themselves as a joint objective to tackle these problems and create a unique transfer product. The intensive operational cooperation between the 3 partners allows to guarantee a seamless 50 minute transfer between 2 flights which the passenger will spend in quiet and comfort. Brussels Airport will thus become the European hub for flights to India, Africa, Canada and the Unites States and will interconnect large parts of the world.

A look behind the screens
At present within a time span of 2 hours, i.e. between 7.40 a.m. and 9.55 a.m., four Jet Airways flights land daily at Brussels Airport. These passengers originate from Mumbai, Delhi, Newark and Toronto. Only a small percentage of these passengers stay in Belgium, most of them travel on. Jet Airways allows these passengers to travel on immediately to Newark, Toronto, Mumbai and Delhi. All these flights also take off within a limited period, i.e. between 9.40 a.m. and 11.55 a.m. These eight operations must be finely tuned.

Transfer passengers are flown in by Brussels Airlines from various European destinations and Africa and vice versa.

The airport currently welcomes 17 million passengers per year. Jet Airways will contribute a further 1 million extra passengers per year, this can only be achieved with an outstanding planning of the infrastructure, in which user comfort plays a crucial role.

Impact of the hub on Brussels Airport

Brussels Airport is currently building the adaptations and infrastructure expansions which the operations of a European hub of this importance require.

The security capacity is being strengthened as well as the luggage handling and passenger reception facilities.

The transfer infrastructure has been improved. More shops and food and drink outlets will be available to the new public that will visit the airport. Brussels Airport will offer one of the best Duty Frees in Europe.

In the operational zones Brussels Airport will allocate the gates as efficiently as possible with a screening option right next to the gates. Also the location of the lounges, shops, food and drink outlets and Internet and communication options will be built as close as possible to the Jet Airways gates.

With these activities Jet Airways will create more than 1000 extra direct jobs and no fewer than 2000 jobs indirectly related to the construction of the European hub of Jet Airways.

Effect on passengers
The immediate effect for the (transfer) passenger is that he/she will benefit from more direct destinations from and efficient connection through Brussels, but also from more quality, improved infrastructure and comfort during the trip.

Jet Airways and Brussels Airport are executing a two phase plan to build 2 exclusive lounges for respectively Jet Airways First and Première passengers close to the Jet Airways gates at the B-Pier. This lounge will offer unequalled comfort to Jet Airways passengers: they will be able to relax with a drink or meal, or enjoy an invigorating shower. They will also have the option of using their time efficiently by working on their laptops and benefiting from the telephony connection points and the Wi-Fi facilities.

Code sharing and frequent flyer programmes
Jet Airways offers flights to Mumbai and Delhi in a code share agreement with Brussels Airlines. This agreement is valid for destinations of Jet Airways in India, currently restricted to Mumbai and Delhi. Subject to the bilateral approval of the competent authorities other destinations will soon be added to this list.

By the codeshare agreement, the frequent flyer programmes of Jet Airways and Brussels Airlines, Jet Privilege and Privilege Programme, become compatible. Privilege members of Brussels Airlines can earn airmiles if they fly with Jet Airways on codeshare destinations and vice versa. They can also spend their airmiles within the entire network of the codesharepartner.

About Jet Airways

Jet Airways currently operates a fleet of 66 aircraft, including 5 Boeing 777-300ER, 50 classic and new generation Boeing 737-400/700/800/900, 4 Airbus A330-200 and 7 modern ATR 72-500 turboprop aircraft. With an average life span of 4.9 years per plane, the airline has one of the youngest fleets in the world. Jet Airways handles around 340 daily flights to 52 destinations in India, and outside India to London Heathrow, Singapore, Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia, Colombo in Sri Lanka, Bangkok in Thailand and Kathmandu in Nepal, Brussels, Newark and Toronto.The airline is planning a phased expansion of its activities in North America, Europe, Asia and Africa. Since it commenced its activities in May 1993, Jet Airways had carried more than 74 million passengers by the end of May 2007.

About Brussels Airlines
Brussels Airlines is the Belgian airline group offering the greatest number of flights to and from the European capital, Brussels. On its short haul European routes, Brussels Airlines offers both a low fare product with the lowest price guarantee and a travel formula for those seeking comfort and time savings. The 2,900 employees of the Brussels Airlines group guarantee more than 300 daily flights to more than 50 European premium airports. Brussels Airlines also provides a long haul service to 14 destinations in Africa and, thanks to its partnerships, offers long haul flights to North America, the United Arab Emirates, China, and, from August 2007, India. Brussels Airlines came into being on 7 November 2006 as a result of the merger of the largest Belgian full-service airline, SN Brussels Airlines, and Virgin Express, the first low fare airline in mainland Europe that was founded more than ten years ago. The first Brussels Airlines flight took off on 25 March 2007.

About Brussels Airport
Brussels Airport, airport of the Capital of Europe, services 17 million passengers on a yearly basis, travelling to more then 200 cities in Europe and the world. Brussels Airport wants to be the most European, friendly and efficient airport in the world. During the last five years, the airport was consistently voted as one of the very best airports in Europe. It received the ‘Best Airport in Europe’ award in 2005 en de Airport People Award in 2006;

Upon arrival at LAS late last week it was clear that JetBlue was running a tad behind as far as flights East were concerned. Our flight was delayed two hours, but our more immediate concern was would we make our connection at JFK? Knowing we were on the last flight from JFK to BOS, visions of spending the night on a dirty JFK floor filled our heads. The JetBlue desk jockey assured us we would make the connection.

When we arrived at JFK not only did we make our connection, but JetBlue held the plane so all passengers with connections could get on board. Fair enough. Our flight ended up landing in Boston maybe 15 minutes later than it was originally scheduled to, again, fair enough.

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JetBlue didn't have to do this. After all, they ended up getting us to our final destination on time, which is really the endgame. However, the fact that the airline issued us this voucher sure will earn them a egoboo heading into the sketchy winter flying season.