Tata Group is working on an immense plan to outline the expansion of Air India and Air India Express. The group of members is appointed to set up six Boeing 777-200 aircraft and 25 Airbus A320 Neos by the first quarter of 2023. Tata is contemplating taking aircraft from the secondary lease market to strengthen its capacity in the short run. Boeing 777 aircraft is set to lease from US airline Delta. Delta had phased out 18 Boeing 777 aircraft after the pandemic.
The aircraft will join the task force by October and will be used to upsurge flights on the India-US route. It will be most profitable for the airline. A320 Neo jets will start joining the fleet starting next year, this will increase the capacity on domestic routes. The airline is also nearby to get 10 grounded wide-body aircraft back to service by early 2023. Its wide-body fleet presently stands at 43. Air India Express is also aggregating its capacity by taking five Boeing 737 aircraft from the company Vistara. It operates mostly on India-Middle East routes. Tata Group’s three airlines (Air India, AirAsia India, and Vistara) held a 24 per cent share of the Indian aviation market.
The report also said that Air India Express is considering increasing the capacity by taking five Boeing 737 aircraft from Vistara. As part of its fleet expansion plan, Air India has decided to allow its pilots to fly till the age of 65. This decision was taken by Air India on July 29th and was made public.
The airline said, “DGCA (Directorate General of Civil Aviation) agrees pilots fly till the age of 65 years, compared to the Air India retirement age of 58 years. Permitting pilots to fly till the age of 65 is an exercise followed by most airlines in the industry. It also added saying that meeting our requirement, proposed to retain our current qualified pilots at Air India post-retirement on a predetermined basis for five years extendable to 65 years. The aviation industry sources also confirmed that Air India is considering buying more than 200 new planes.
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