Now, fly the big birds even on shorter routes
NEW DELHI: No need to travel overseas. You can now fly the big birds such as the A330 and the B787 even on domestic routes.
Thanks to rising traffic, Indian carriers are giving passengers a never-before experience of travelling in wide-body jets on short-haul regional sectors.
Jet Airways has introduced the wide-body Airbus A330 on the country’s busiest domestic route — between Delhi and Mumbai. National carrier Air India (AI) is considering a proposal to deploy two of its brand new Boeing 787 Dreamliners for exclusive domestic use.
Indian carriers mostly operate narrow-body jets such as A320 and B737 on domestic routes, with a seating capacity of 168-180. Widebody jets are mostly used for long-haul flights to overseas destinations like London.
The A330 deployed by Jet on the Delhi-Mumbai route can accommodate 90 more passengers than a B737, which it usually flies on domestic routes.
“We fly the A330 at the peak time of 5 pm and are looking at opportunities to fly more wide-body jets,” a Jet official said.
“It has been a big success. A big advantage of flying a wide-body aircraft is that Mumbai and Delhi are slotconstrained airports. If you are able to carry more number of passengers for the limited slots, you are obviously getting a significant advantage out of
it,” said Amit Agarwal, acting CEO of Jet Airways.
AI already uses the 256-seater Dreamliner for add-on flights like LondonDelhi-Kolkata during the spare time. “Besides Kolkata, the 787s are also deployed for add-on flights to Bangalore, Chennai and Mumbai,” an AI official said.
“On an average, flights are 85% full. More importantly, the business class is mostly sold out and hence the yields are higher,” the official added.
“Deploying wide-body jets can prove to be a gamechanger and money-spinner for airlines,” aviation expert Rajji Rai said.