Mumbai: A day after Air India’s Dreamliner operations took a massive blow, the airline announced to reduce its international services on widebody aircraft by 15% till mid July.
On Tuesday, The Free Press Journal reported that Air India’s international operations suffered severely due to unavailability of aircraft as the civil aviation regulator Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) has mandated safety checks on its Boeing 787-8/9 Dreamliner fleet.
Out of total 33 aircraft, inspections have now been completed on 26 and these have been cleared for service, while inspection of the remainder will be complete in the coming days.
On Wednesday, Air India announced that it will also undertake enhanced safety checks on its Boeing 777 fleet as a matter of added precaution. With enhanced safety checks on Dreamliner aircraft, airspace restrictions over Iran and its voluntary checks on Boeing 777 fleet, the airline is struggling with ensuring stability of our operations. These factors led to certain disruptions on their international operations over the last six days leading to a total of 83 cancellations.
Due to these compounding circumstances, it announced to reduce its international services on widebody aircraft by 15% for the next few weeks. The cuts will be implemented between now and 20 June and will continue thereafter until at least mid-July.
The airline believes that it will result to better efficiency and to minimise inconvenience to passengers as this will add to their reserve aircraft availability to take care of any unplanned disruptions.
Air India apologised to the passengers affected due to these curtailments, and assured that it will inform them in advance and make its best efforts to accommodate them on alternate flights.
It also announced that passengers will be offered a choice to reschedule their travel without any cost or to be given full refund, as per their choice. The revised schedule of the international services effective from June 20 will be shared shortly by the airline.
“The curtailments are a painful measure to take, but are necessary following a devasting event which we are still working through and an unusual combination of external events. It is done to restore operational stability, and to minimise last-minute inconvenience to passengers. With the continued support of our passengers, the regulatory authorities, Ministry of Civil Aviation and India at large, we will come out stronger through this tragic incident and reestablish the confidence of our passengers and all stakeholders in our services, at the earliest,” read the statement by Air India.
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