Page 43 - Air India

Regulator fines Air India Rs 1.1 cr for violating flight safety rules

Tata Group-run airline was under DGCA's scrutiny in 2023, was asked to pay Rs 30 lakh as fine earlier this month

DGCA slaps Rs 1.10 crore penalty on Air India for safety violations

The safety violations took place on certain long-range terrain critical routes, the DGCA said

Air India begins commercial operations of wide-body A350 aircraft

Private carrier Air India on Monday commenced the commercial operations of its first wide-body A350 aircraft with a flight taking off for Chennai from the Mumbai airport. The 316-seater A350-900 aircraft has a three-class cabin configuration with 28 private business suites with full-flat beds, 24 premium economy and 264 economy seats. "Air India flight AI-589 took off from Mumbai's Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport on Monday for Chennai, with a full-capacity load of passengers," the airline said in a statement. The aircraft will initially fly on domestic routes -- Bengaluru, Chennai, Delhi, Hyderabad, and Mumbai -- for crew familiarisation and regulatory compliance. It will later be deployed for long-haul flights to destinations across continents, strengthening Air India's growing wide-body fleet, comprising its own and recently leased aircraft, the airline said. The first of Air India's own 20 Airbus A350-900 aircraft, registered VT-JRA, arrived at Delhi's Indira

A-I CEO lists features of Airbus A350, says it's 'highly fuel efficient'

Civil Aviation Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia on Thursday inaugurated India's and Air India's first Airbus A350 aircraft on the first day of Wings India 2024

Airbus forms JV with Air India to launch pilot training centre in Gurugram

Airbus has partnered with Tata group-owned Air India for setting up a pilots training facility in Gurugram, Haryana, under a 50:50 joint venture, the company said on Thursday. Besides, the European aviation major also announced a collaboration with GMR Aero Technic to offer aircraft maintenance engineering training courses at the latter's facility in Hyderabad. Spread over 3,300 sq mt, the Tata Airbus training centre will be equipped with 10 full flight simulators (FFS), flight training classrooms and briefing and debriefing rooms as part of the complete Airbus Flight Training Device setup, Airbus said. The facility, which is expected to be operational from early 2025 with the initial installation of four A320 FFS, will offer A320 and A350 flight training to some 5,000 new pilots over 10 years, it said. It will offer courses approved by India's DGCA and European aviation safety regulator, EASA, Airbus said. Under its collaboration with GMR Aero Technic, Airbus said it will provide

Merger into Air India likely by mid 2025, says Vistara CEO Kannan

Kannan emphasised that the airline is cash flow positive and will not require any capital infusion from its stakeholders in the near future

Air India's virtual travel assistant is now on Whatsapp. Details here

Air India's virtual travel assistant will help travellers to ask questions across a wide spectrum of over 1300 travel-related topics and access a host of features

Vistara expects all legal approvals for merger with A-I in 1st half of 2024

Vistara CEO Vinod Kannan on Monday said all legal approvals for its proposed merger with Air India are expected to be in place in the first half of 2024. In November 2022, Tata group announced the merger of Vistara with Air India under a deal wherein Singapore Airlines will also acquire a 25.1 per cent stake in Air India. At a briefing here, Kannan said the legal approvals for the merger are expected by the middle of 2024 and the operational merger is anticipated by early or middle of next year. He also said that all competition approvals are expected in the current quarter ending March. On September 1, 2023, the Competition Commission of India (CCI) approved the proposed merger. Currently, Vistara has 67 planes in its fleet. The airline is a joint venture between Tatas and Singapore Airlines.

Untrained pilots in fog: DGCA issues notices to Air India, SpiceJet

Hundreds of flights were delayed during the fog season in December

DGCA issues notice to Air India, SpiceJet for rostering untrained pilots

A senior DGCA official confirmed that the notice was issued to airlines after it was found that a large number of flight diversions that were reported at Indira Gandhi International Airport in Delhi

Air India appoints P Balaji as chief of regulatory and corporate affairs

P Balaji resigned from telecom operator Vodafone Idea on Tuesday after a decade-long stint. He is set to assume his role at Air India on January 11

Aviation watchdog DGCA carried out 5,745 surveillance activities in 2023

Regulator DGCA carried out 5,745 surveillance activities with respect to airlines, airports and approved organisations in 2023 as part of its efforts to ensure compliance and enhance safety standards in the aviation space, The activities included 4,039 planned surveillance and 1,706 spot checks and night surveillance. Subsequently, the findings resulted in 542 enforcement actions, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) said in a release on Wednesday. The number of surveillance activities rose 26 per cent last year compared to 2022. Also, the number of enforcement actions increased 77 per cent last year compared to 305 enforcement actions taken against non-compliant personnel, airlines, and other operators in 2022. These enforcement actions included financial penalties against airlines such as Air India, AirAsia (India), IndiGo and SpiceJet. Besides, the watchdog had temporarily suspended its approval to Air India's training facilities, as per the release. Enforcement acti

Air India to fly wide-body A350 jet from Jan 22 on domestic routes

Aircraft that has three-class cabin configuration will later be used for 'destinations across continents'

Air India's new Airbus A350 to enter commercial service on January 22

The first flight of the A350 aircraft will be between Bengaluru and Mumbai at 7:05 am on January 22

Pilot unions express concern as Air India 'threats of appropriate measures'

Pilot unions at Air India on Sunday expressed "concern" over the Tata Group-owned airline's alleged threat to the cockpit staff with "appropriate measures" if pilots report sick for duty. In a communication to Air India senior vice president for flight operations Manish Uppal on Sunday, Indian Pilots Guild (IPG) and Indian Commercial Pilots Association (ICPA) said that reporting illnesses without the "fear of reprisal" is in the interest of flight safety. IPG is the wide-body aircraft pilots' body at Air India while ICPA represents pilots who fly narrow-body Airbus 320 family aircraft of the full-service carrier. The copies of the letter have also been marked to Air India Chairman N Chandrasekaran, DGCA Vikram Dev Dutt, Air India Managing Director and CEO Campbell Wilson, among others. "We are writing to express our concern and objection regarding recent communications implying threats of appropriate measures for sick reporting," the pilot bodies said in the communication. Stating

Year Ender: 10 big events that shaped the Indian corporate world in 2023

From Hindenburg's report on the Adani Group to the signing of the biggest aircraft orders by Air India and Indigo, India saw several important corporate news in 2023. Here are the 10 most significant

Air India, Airbus in talks to set up Rs 3,500 crore pilot training facility

The facility is expected to be formed under a joint venture between the two companies where each will have a 50% stake

Delhi fog: Air India flyers can reschedule flights to and from IGI Airport

The passengers will be allowed to rebook any other Air India flight operating on the same route in the next three days free of charge

Air India's first wide-body A350-900 aircraft lands in national capital

Air India's first wide-body A350-900 aircraft, sporting new brand livery, arrived here from European aviation major Airbus' Toulouse facility in France. The aircraft, registered as VT-JRA, touched down at the national capital's Indira Gandhi International Airport at 1346 hrs, making the Tata Group-owned airline the first aircraft operator in India to have this type of aircraft in its fleet, a statement said. The delivery flight is operated using a special call sign AI350, it said. The aircraft is the first of Air India's 20 Airbus A350-900 on order, with five more scheduled for delivery through March 2024, the airline said. As part of its now rejigged 250 aircraft order with Airbus, Air India will acquire 40 A350s, comprising 20 each A350-900 and A350-1000 aircraft, along with 140 narrow-body A321neo and 70 A320neo planes. The arrival of the first Airbus A350-900 is, in many ways, "a declaration of Indian aviation's resurgence on the world stage," Air India Chief Executive Officer

Japan's SMBC lends $120 mn to Air India to buy A350-900 aircraft

Aircraft secured debt facility struck in GIFT City, says lender