BATAVIA AIR TO OPEN FLIGHT ROUTE TO SORONG JUNE 1

Jakarta, May 28 (ANTARA) - Private airline company Batavia Air is to expand its aviation business in East Indonesia by opening a new route with stops in Jakarta,Makassar and Sorong on June 1, 2009.

"The economic growth of Sorong in Papua which is quite good in the sector of tourism with its beautiful natural panorama and Koja Empat sea park has come up as the main consideration to open the new flight route," Batavia Air's public relations officer Eddy Haryanto said here on Wednesday.

Eddy said the flight to Sorong will be served regularly at least three times a week by a Boeing.

The additional flights to Sorong, according to him, were aimed at complementing the flights to East Indonesian regions after earlier opening a Jakarta-Makassar-Manokwari-Jayapura route.

Batavia Air will continue to carry out flight expansion to the regions with better economic growth in addition to having prospective tourism prospects.

The airline was now flying to 10 cities in East Indonesia with the numbers of passengers rising continuously.

"Makassar, Manado, Ternate, Gorontalo, Ambon, Jayapura, Berau (Tarakan), Balikpapan, Manokwari and Sorong are flight routes regularly served by Batavia Air," Eddy said.

Batavia Air has 36 types of aircraft consisting of 11 Boeing 737s, 14 Boeing 400s and six Airbus 319s and 320s.

Those planes served flights routes to 32 cities in Indonesia and two flight routes to Kuching in Malaysia and Guangzhou in China.