TravTalk Middle East Online Magazine
Air India launched the second Dreamliner from Dubai to Kochi on February 1, 2017.
Shehara Rizly
Air India’s flight 934 will be a daily operation with departure from Dubai at 1330 hours arriving in to Kochi at 1850 hours. The return from Kochi will be AI 933 departing at 0915 hours from Kochi and arrive in Dubai at 1200 hours.
The press briefing was presided over by Consul General of India, H.E. Anurag Bhushan and Melvin D’Silva, Regional Manager-Middle East and Africa, Air India. The Consul General reiterated that last year the national carrier has seen an increase in capacity and the regional connectivity has improved quite well.
D’Silva stated that Air India is on a very aggressive growth trajectory to become No. 3 in the world after the US and China with a young strong fleet of 107 aircraft and their aim is to “fly more and fill more.” Kerala has become an important destination as there has been a 24 per cent increase of traffic from Dubai. Within the next four years they will be purchasing nearly 100 new aircraft and they have planned about 30 to 35 aircraft to be purchased this year. In order to promote the new Dubai-Kochi service, they will be offering a free baggage allowance of 40 kgs on Economy Class and 50 kgs on Business Class.
Some of the upcoming new routes will be Delhi-Copenhagen from May on the Dreamliner increasing their coverage of the European network with the existing flights to London, Birmingham, Paris, Rome, Milan, Frankfurt, Moscow, Vienna and Madrid. In July this year, AI would be linking the capitals of India with USA with a non-stop service between Delhi and Washington on their Boeing 777. This flight will add to the North American nonstop flights to New York, Newark, Chicago and San Francisco.
Air India will commence operations linking Bangkok with cities of Kolkata and Chandigarh as well. On the domestic front, frequencies from Delhi to popular destinations such as Port Blair, Bangkok, Leh, Nagpur and Ahmedabad will be increased from the summer schedule.
