Air India has been terrible with optimising its aircraft for US operations. However, With the addition of the (ex-Delta) 77Ls and (ex-Etihad) 77Ws to the fleet, Air India is trying to enhance its operations to the US. There is not much they can do in the case of Delhi when flying to the US East Coast, given that the airline needs specially kitted 777 aircraft with an extra supply of oxygen to navigate the Hindu Kush mountain range, where the tallest peaks can go up to 25,000 feet. However, Air India has been replacing other routes with these jets.
Air India entirely moves all US flights from Mumbai to the leased 777s
Air India has deployed its newly-inducted Boeing 777 aircraft to all three US destinations it serves non-stop from Mumbai: New York JFK Airport, Newark Liberty Airport (New Jersey), and San Francisco. This ensures that, for the first time, all North American cities served by Air India from Mumbai have been upgraded to aircraft with newer-generation seats and inflight entertainment systems in all classes.
In addition, one of the two daily Air India flights between Mumbai and London Heathrow (AI130/AI131) will now also operate on the new B777 aircraft, offering modern generation interiors and introducing First Class cabins, as already reported by LFAL.
The B777-200LR aircraft serving San Francisco and New York-JFK comes with 28 Business, 48 Premium Economy and 212 Economy Class seats, whilst the B777-300ER serving Newark-Liberty and London offers 8 First Class, 40 Business and 280 Economy Class seats.
First Class on board Air India’s 777-300ER, which were recently inducted.
Campbell Wilson, MD & CEO of Air India, said
We are delighted to now offer an elevated experience on all routes from Mumbai to the United States, and to upgrade one of our London services. This is part of the ongoing product transformation underway at Air India, with 7 new B777s inducted over the last year to be followed by 4 more, along with 6 new Airbus A350s, over the coming months. All of these aircraft feature much-improved interiors and pave the way for the full interior upgrade of our entire widebody fleet commencing in the middle of 2024.
Overall, while there is no product consistency, flying these planes is better than flying the older Air India jets, which may or may not have the IFE working and an armrest broken.
Bottomline
Air India has transitioned from its owned jets to some leased jets, which earlier used to fly for Delta or Etihad, for all the services it operates between Mumbai and the US stations, i.e., New York JFK, New York Newark and San Francisco. It has also transitioned one of the Mumbai – London Heathrow services to operate with one of these Boeing 777s.
Have you flown Air India on the revamped routes? What has been your experience?
Liked our articles and our efforts? Please pay an amount you are comfortable with; an amount you believe is the fair price for the content you have consumed. Please enter an amount in the box below and click on the button to pay; you can use Netbanking, Debit/Credit Cards, UPI, QR codes, or any Wallet to pay. Every contribution helps cover the cost of the content generated for your benefit.
(Important: to receive confirmation and details of your transaction, please enter a valid email address in the pop-up form that will appear after you click the ‘Pay Now’ button. For international transactions, use Paypal to process the transaction.)
We are not putting our articles behind any paywall where you are asked to pay before you read an article. We are asking you to pay after you have read the article if you are satisfied with the quality and our efforts.
Hi I feel the air india flight from Mum-JFK premier is a Ghost Cabin because of my second experience while traveling in the return leg and the origi leg the tickets are issued by air india for permier economy but when you reach the check in counter the duty manager informs that due to air craft change the permier economy is removed and the passenger is left with no choice and has to travel on the congested seats in economy. The big fun is that air india never informed me and many other passengers about the change of the cabin type and the bigger fun was that passengers were being handed over boarding passes without informing that the cabin has been degraded to Exonony from premier economy.
This is for the 20/May flight from mumbai to JFK
It was understood that this route has changed the aircraft type from around last 2 weeks but we the passengers never got any intimation about this.
Anticipating to travel in a bit of luxury when you have to travel for 16 hours in the crampy seat with very less leg space I know how it feels tired. In the air craft there weee several senior citizens who did not know the difference between premier economy and economy who checked with me if the seat offer to them was of premier economy.
Any way I have cancelled my booking on the return leg and re booked with BA on premier economy.secondly as per DGCA regulations the airlines should refund 75% of the fare including taxes if they degrade the passenger cabin, but in my case they have r funded me only 75% of the base fare and when I checked with them they informed me to raise concern on the website of air india for this.
Because of this behavior and response to the customer service I may never in my life travel on air india next time.