Kathmandu: The national flag carrier Nepal Airlines Corporation (NAC) conducted its maiden flight to the Riyadh-based King Khalid International Airport in Saudi Arabia.
The landing marked the launch of the direct flight between Kathmandu and Riyadh.
Speaking at a program organized at Riyadh on Saturday, Riyadh-based Nepali Embassy’s deputy chief of mission Dilip Kumar Paudel expressed his hope that connecting Kathmandu with the Saudi Arabia with the NAC direct flight would not only contribute to further consolidate the diplomatic relations between the two nations, but also help further widen a door of economic prosperity for the NAC.
“The NAC has been successful in operating the flights following tremendous efforts,” he said, adding that it would play a significant role in enhancing the country’s visibility and promoting its identity in an international arena.
Presently there are 400 thousand Nepalis in the Saudi Arabia.
The Himalaya Airlines, a joint investment airlines company of Nepal and China, is operating direct flights to Kathmandu from here and Damam.
NAC will operate flights two days a week using the narrow-body airplane in the initial phase. The national-flag carrier started its inaugural flight from a wide-body A 330 aircraft on April 22. NAC recently got permission for operating flights to and from Riyadh, Damam and Jeddah. The Riyadh-based General Authority of Civil Aviation gave permission to operate flights to these three destinations.
NAC has offered concessional airfare, managed in-flight food and 40 kilograms luggage facility to passengers on the return flight from Riyadh.
The flight time from Kathmandu to Riyadh is six hours 15 minutes and the return air travel time to Kathmandu is four hours 50 minutes.
Now, NAC will be operating regular flights to 10 destinations in eight countries, including Riyadh.
Before this, it had been conducting flights to nine destinations in seven countries including three destinations in India. It has been operating flights to New Delhi, Mumbai and Bangalore of India, Dubai, Doha, Kuala Lumpur, Hong Kong, Bangkok and Narita, Japan.
NAC has two wide-bodies ‘A’ 330 and two narrow-body ‘A’ 320 planes for international flights.
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