Back in May 2017, Air India announced on Twitter that they will launch 3x weekly Mumbai-Frankfurt and Mumbai-Nairobi flights each from July 2017. Finally, in September 2018, Air India opened up bookings for 4x weekly 787-8 flights on Mumbai-Frankfurt route with the first flight on October 28, 2018.
#AIUpdate: #AirIndia to launch thrice a week flt (Boeing 787) connecting #NBO & #FRA ex #BOM in July 2017. Stay tuned for updates!
— Air India (@airindia) May 17, 2017
On June 14, 2019, the new Civil Aviation Minister, Hardeep Singh Puri announced that Air India will launch 3x weekly 777-300ER flights on Amritsar-Delhi-Toronto route from September 27, 2019. On June 17, 2019, Hardeep Singh Puri tweeted that Air India will start 4x weekly flights on Mumbai-Nairobi route from September 27, 2019.
I am delighted to announce that on the occasion of World Tourism Day on 27th Sept 2019, @airindiain will begin a direct Mumbai-Nairobi flight (4 days a week) to improve air connectivity between India & Kenya. pic.twitter.com/fX26RYWpp2
— Hardeep Singh Puri (मोदी का परिवार) (@HardeepSPuri) June 17, 2019
Air India operated flights to Nairobi back in the day. They used to operate flights on Mumbai-Nairobi-Dar es Salaam sector but pulled out in 2010 due to high operating costs. Kenya Airways currently operates 2x daily flights blocked at 6:30 hours one way with a 737-800. I have travelled on this route before, KQ 211/204 and it was a comfortable flight on a narrowbody.
Air India A321
Apart from Kenya Airways, Air India will also compete with fellow Star Alliance member, Ethiopian Airlines which offers cheaper one-stop fares almost throughout the year. As of now, Ethiopian is offering INR 24k roundtrip one-stop economy fares on Mumbai-Nairobi route, which are INR 11k cheaper than what Kenya Airways is charging for non-stop flights.
Apart from this, Hardeep Singh Puri also announced that Air India will operate 4x weekly flights on Delhi-Chennai-Bali route from October 27, 2019.
Delighted to announce the commencement of a four days a week @airindiain flight to connect Delhi-Chennai-Bali from 27th October 2019. This flight will enhance connectivity & push the flow of tourists & travellers between India & Bali. pic.twitter.com/JJkJa5PuMz
— Hardeep Singh Puri (मोदी का परिवार) (@HardeepSPuri) June 17, 2019
As usual, Air India hasn’t announced the routes yet nor have they put out a schedule yet. Air India may operate an A320neo or an A321 on both the routes, especially considering there is a stop in Chennai for the Delhi-Bali route. Air India has a few A321s grounded for quite some time apart from some A319s, 747s, 787s and a 777. All grounded aircraft are expected to back by October 2019.
Air India’s new routes: Mumbai-Nairobi and Delhi-Chennai-Bali
It is also reported that Air India will also start Mumbai-Hong Kong route this winter.
Hey air india will actually use the 787 in both routes u r wrong by the way
Arlene
Thanks and hope you are right ..
Cheers
AI should aim to use 787 on NBO route to attract passengers from Kenya
it is true that it will
BOM-NBO is always full on both KQ flights.
A gateway to East Africa, AI should make code sharing with KQ for connections beyond NBO. After ET, KQ is other airline eith good connections across Africa.
Back in those days of 9W, I had enjoyed earning tons of jpmiles flying on KQ.
BOM-FRA-BOM is actually 4x weekly last I checked.
NBO repetitive given KQ already does this. Would have been nicer to see BOM-JNB—a larger as well as higher yielding market, completely unserved!
DPS is considerably further away from India than SIN. Bali is actually closer to East Coast Australia, so you see the B737 operating MEL-DPS-MEL for example. Makes the economics more challenging. Perhaps the MAA stop will enable narrowbody use.
BTW Bali is a HUGE market from India nowadays. People may think that Garuda stopped their BOM flight because of small market size, but the actual reason (from Bahasa Indonesia-language media) was that the service was contingent on a subsidy, which never materialised.
Challenges for any airline attempting India-Bali:
–longer distance as compared to Singapore/Malaysia/Thailand
–Leisure driven market with lack of business class passengers