First commercial flight takes off from new terminal at Kolkata

Air India's Kolkata-London via Delhi flight takes off from the New Integrated Terminal Building of the Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose International Airport

Air India's Kolkata-London via Delhi flight, the first commercial one, took off from the New Integrated Terminal Building of the Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose International Airport, on the great patriot's 116th birth anniversary on Wednesday. The 172-seater Airbus 321 took off at 10:00 am from the swank, state-of-the-art new terminal at 10:00 am marking a new beginning in the annals of domestic civil aviation, an AI release said here. Flight AI021 on the Kolkata-Delhi-London sector had 150 passengers, including 65 London-bound passengers on board, it said. Passengers boarding the flight through the modern aerobridge were greeted with rosebuds.

From tomorrow, all domestic and international flights of Air India would be operated from the airport’s old terminal building till the new one was available to airlines for regular service later on, it said.