Bharat Petroleum refuels Sri Lankan airlines flights at Indian airports, amid country's deepening fuel crisis
Jul 07, 2022
New Delhi [India], July 7 : Over 100 flights of Sri Lankan airlines have been refuelled by India's gas and petroleum refineries company, Bharat Petroleum at Indian airports as a support to the country reeling under its worst economic crisis and facing fuel shortage.
Taking to Twitter, Bharat Petroleum in a tweet said, "We are pleased to support Sri Lankan Airlines, with the refuelling of their long-haul flights at Indian airports, to overcome the Jet Fuel shortage in their country. So far, more than 100 flights have been refuelled at Trivandrum, Chennai & Kochi airports."
Bharat Petroleum Limited has been associated with the Sri Lankan airlines as their refuelling partners for over a decade. It has been refuelling the long-haul flights of Sri Lankan Airlines at the Thiruvananthapuram, Chennai and Kochi airports for around the last 15 days.
"These refuellings have been done over the last fortnight by mobilising the assets and manpower for the on-time service, at very short notice. We have been associated with @flysrilankan for over a decade, as their refuelling partners," tweeted Bharat Petroleum.
Recently, it was reported that Sri Lankan Airlines is now bracing for potential cancellations of its flights until July 18 as the jet fuel reserves in the country have run out,
With this looming fuel crisis, Sri Lankan Airlines told the employees that the flight operations will likely be impacted until the 18th of this month.
Sri Lankan management while issuing an internal memo to its employees last week, announced that the airline ran out of available jet fuel stocks on June 29 and added that due to this the services will be affected.
In an advisory earlier, the Sri Lankan Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) on June 28 issued a notice to the airlines to carry fuel for their return journeys. This is because Sri Lanka's oil and gas company -- Ceylon Petroleum Corporation (CPC) -- has failed to import the required jet fuel into the country due to the foreign exchange crisis.
It is worth noting that the daily fuel usage of Sri Lankan Airlines out of Bandaranaike International Airport (BIA) is around 700,000 litres. However, the airport only managed to secure approximately 250,000 litres per day on average.
The economy in Sri Lanka is bracing for a sharp contraction due to the unavailability of basic inputs for production, an 80 per cent depreciation of the currency since March 2022, coupled with a lack of foreign reserves and the country's failure to meet its international debt obligations.
The economic crisis has particularly impacted food security, agriculture, livelihoods, and access to health services. Food production in the last harvest season was 40 - 50 per cent lower than last year, and the current agricultural season is at risk, with seeds, fertilizers, fuel and credit shortages.
