Anticipating A Surge In Passengers, Pelita Air Adds Extra Flight To Denpasar, Padang, And Pekanbaru

Pelita Air (Photo: Doc. Antara)

PT Pertamina (Persero) projects that there will be an increase in the number of passengers during the 2024 Christmas and 2025 New Year (Nataru) holidays by 47 percent or 167,393 passengers.

Pertamina Director Simon Aloysius Mantiri said to anticipate a surge in passengers, Pelita Air proposed additional flights on three routes reaching 5,760, an increase of 300 percent compared to normal days.

Rute, which we add, there are three priorities, namely Bali, Padang, and Pekanbaru. That's the route we added. For other routes, I think it's normal as usual," he said at a press conference at the Ministry of SOEs Office, Jakarta, Monday, December 9.

Regarding the number of seats prepared for the 2024 Christmas and 2025 New Year holidays, Simon said it reached 200,952 seats.

"Pelita Air will provide 200,952 flight seat capacities compared to normal days of around 160,000 to serve 16 domestic flight routes, in order to support Nataru's needs," he said.

For your information, the surge in passengers is predicted to occur at airports or airports during the Christmas 2024 and New Year 2025 periods. The surge was driven by the government's policy to reduce the ticket price by 10 percent.

Previously, Minister of State-Owned Enterprises (BUMN) Erick Thohir visited Soekarno-Harta Airport (Soetta), Tangerang, Banten. The visit was to check airport readiness for the 2024 Christmas and 2025 New Year holidays.

Not only ensuring airport readiness, Erick also checked ticket prices for state-owned airlines such as Garuda Indonesia, Citilink, and Pelita Air. This check was carried out to ensure ticket prices fell 10 percent during the Nataru holiday period.

"I was checking ticket prices together. Garuda greetings first, right. I checked Citilink right, Pelita is also right," he said at Terminal 3 of Soetta Airport, Tangerang, Banten, Wednesday, December 4.

According to Erick, a 10 percent reduction in plane ticket prices is a joint work for all parties. For example, PT Pertamina (Persero) which also reduced the price of avtur and PT Angkasa Pura Indonesia, which also reduced airport thigh costs.

"Thank you to Pertaminan and Airport for how we try to help better ticket prices according to the instructions of the President," he said.