ISLAMABAD, April 15: Airline fuel saving campaign initiated by the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) on Karachi-Islamabad sector through improved airspace management resulted in over Rs4.94 million savings in a month for three carriers.

“The results of the fuel saving campaign have been very promising and hold the potential of substantial savings for the airlines,” an official said while sharing the statistics of the campaign with Dawn on Saturday.

In addition to saving the fuel, the total flight time during this period was cut by 29 hours and 35 minutes. One of the newly emerging private airlines made most of this campaign as the benefits its obtained from the drive if quantified in terms of percentage were as high as 51.7 per cent.

Although, in terms of the total amount saved by an airline, the national flag carrier was way ahead of it because PIA operated maximum number of flights with wide bodied aircraft.

How did the campaign work? The airlines were offered direct routing instead of the normal ATS route. The difference between the direct and normal route to and from Islamabad is approximately 68NM. The jets travel at 8 NM/minute and flying time saving on direct route in 8 minutes on a Karachi-Islamabad flight.

Additional benefits of the campaign that cannot be translated in financial terms are fast track ground check time for maintenance, early arrival at destination, enhanced aircraft usage life and decrease in air crew fatigue.

Explaining the concept of the fuel saving campaign, the official said, with fuel prices touching the $70 mark, jet fuel prices have correspondingly touched an all time high. Airlines and operators alike are facing the brunt of this effect with eroding profit margins and escalating profit costs.