Air India to launch flights to Madrid from December 1, 2016

Air India is on a roll for international expansion after a long time. That is what a low oil price and access to the new long & thin route enabler the Boeing 787 Dreamliner can do. Last year, they launched a 3x flight to San Francisco, which will go 6x shortly. This year, they launched a flight from Ahmedabad to London & Newark, utilizing a long standing fifth freedom route on the London-Newark route. Before that, they launched a 3x flight from Delhi to Vienna. They still intend to start a flight to Washington DC from Delhi.

Spain was always on the table for them as well, and the back and forth was always between going to Barcelona or going to Madrid. It seems Air India has finally made a decision, and they will launch flights to Madrid in the winter of 2016. While the route has not been loaded on systems, as per RoutesOnline, the airline has already filed for the route to be commencing as of December 1, 2016.

image

The 3 times a week flight is expected to have the following timings:

AI135 DEL1425 – 2020MAD 788 246
AI136 MAD2150 – 1110+1DEL 788 246

The route fits in pretty well with the Vienna flight which is also 3 times a week, and allows for Air India to serve two cities in Europe within a week.

With this, Air India will have 787 flights to quite some places around the world including London, Madrid, Frankfurt, Vienna, Newark & Singapore.

Bottomline

I think this is a great strategy from Air India, just as a true network carrier would do, to operate flights from India to various places around the globe and get the non-stop premium in the bag as well. Now only if they could fix their long haul planes and make the experience being on Air India, I could stop being circumspect about them and be a regular customer.

Join over 5000 people who check-in daily to find out about the best in travel.
Free emails (once-a-day) | RSS Feeds | Facebook Updates | Twitter | Instagram

.

About Ajay

Ajay Awtaney is the Founder and Editor of Live From A Lounge (LFAL), a pioneering digital platform renowned for publishing news and views about aviation, hotels, passenger experience, loyalty programs, travel trends and frequent travel tips for the Global Indian. He is considered the Indian authority on business travel, luxury travel, frequent flyer miles, loyalty credit cards and travel for Indians around the globe. Ajay is a frequent contributor and commentator on the media as well, including ET Now, BBC, CNBC TV18, NDTV, Conde Nast Traveller and many other outlets.

More articles by Ajay »

Comments

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *