Air India is planning to operate its new Boeing 787 Dreamliner on domestic routes and short-haul international routes. However, this is only a short-term plan of the airline and it will offer flights to India from long-haul foreign destinations soon.
The national carrier of India, Air India is planning to use its brand new Dreamliner Boeing 787 for operating flights over short-haul air travel. The airline has taken this move to expand enough crew resources.
News resources reveal that the airline has planned to deploy the new Dreamliner on domestic metro routes and short-haul international routes only beginning from the second week of June.
Anonymous airline sources have been reported to clarify that the deployment of Dreamliner on these short-haul domestic routes is only a short-term deal; the airline will soon use the aircraft to serve international routes for holiday makers booking outbound and inbound flights to India.
Air India is contriving to use the new Dreamliner to operate one of the scheduled return flights from Delhi to Mumbai and Hyderabad which are presently operated with another plane. Moreover, the airline is also likely to operate the new aircraft on short-haul international networks serving destinations like Singapore and Dubai.
Sources indicate that as the training for crew to fly the 787 is largely about the number of landings they undertake with the aircraft, the training process can become a long-drawn out activity if the airline plans to deploy the Dreamliner on international long-haul routes including Europe, Australia and the United States.
Following All Nippon Airways and Japan Airlines, Air India has become the third global airline to receive the Dreamliner. Though the airline was scheduled to get delivery of its first Boeing 787 aircraft in May 2008, due to many reasons like manufacturing delays the delivery got pushed forward to the end of the month.
The new aircraft has capacity to accommodate 210 to 250 passengers on routes spanning 14,200 km to 15,200 km in different cabin classes with generous space for those seeking economy class tickets on cheap flights to India.
