Sensing strong demand for Doha ahead of the 2022 FIFA World Cup, Air India has announced additional weekly flights to the Middle East city from October. The airline has made similar announcements recently for other domestic and international routes, indicating the new management's strategy of network strengthening on profitable routes.
On September 8th, Air India announced that it will operate 20 additional weekly flights between India and Doha (DOH) from October 30th to meet the rising demand for passengers traveling to Qatar for this year's FIFA World Cup.
The new flights will operate from Mumbai (BOM), Hyderabad (HYD), and Chennai (MAA). Mumbai will see 13 weekly new flights to Doha, Hyderabad will have 4, and Chennai, 3. The flights from Mumbai to Doha will be launched in two phases from October 30th. The Chennai-Doha service will start on November 10th, and Hyderabad-Doha will begin a day later.
All these flights are in addition to the existing daily flights between Delhi (DEL) and Doha.
Air India's chief commercial officer Nipun Aggarwal commented,
"Bringing in the football extravaganza in this part of the world, Air India aims to provide strong connectivity between India and Qatar... Our flight schedule has been planned to make the entire travel experience convenient and seamless."
Air India has been planning to strengthen its winter schedule to the Middle East, and the latest announcement is a step in that direction. Last month, Moneycontrol noted that apart from Qatar, the airline is also eyeing more flights to Dubai.
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However, it is already flying its full schedule of 69 weekly flights to DXB, and any additional flights will need government approvals and a change in bilateral agreements.
The demand for Dubai is so high that Air India decided to add capacity to the route in July by deploying more widebody aircraft. Under normal circumstances, the airline uses a mixed fleet of A320 family of airplanes and Boeing 787s to Dubai, but in July, it upped the ratio of the Dreamliners to DXB, operating 35 out of the 69 weekly flights to Dubai using the widebody jets.
As far as Air India's network strengthening is concerned, this isn't an isolated development. The airline's new owners seem keen to capitalize on any available opportunity by targeting profitable routes.
Last month, the airline announced the launch of additional 24 flights between major metro cities in India, focusing on traditional high-volume, but extra competitive, trunk routes. From August 31st, AI has also started operating daily flights on the lucrative Delhi-Vancouver sector.
Fleet optimization is also a top priority with AI's new owners, with grounded planes currently being prepared for service and additional planes being introduced on leases to meet the increasing schedule.
Aggarwal mentioned that over the past few months, Air India has been working closely with partners to return aircraft to service, which has resulted in these additional flights. Looks like the airline is gearing up for a busy winter schedule!
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