Sunday, 15 July 2012

Air India’s winter schedule in trouble


Air India’s scheduling and rostering department is in a fix. The officials are not able to plan ahead for the upcoming winter schedule as the management is not sure how many pilots will be on board after the recent strike.

Over 400 Air India pilots went on strike for nearly two months.

“The decisions are pending. While the Air India is pitching to withdraw its case from the High Court, the pilots who had gone on agitation may do so again if the management does not reinstates all of them without any victimisation. The process is still on and hence we are not planning ahead,” an official said.

Any schedule for an airline is prepared well in advance as it has to go through a series of approvals. An internal process would involve identifying new routes and withdrawing few existing ones, keeping a buffer for CAT III compliant aircraft and crew and selecting the optimum routes.

There are several meetings taking place between AAI officials and representatives of all airlines to fix slots to avoid too many departures and arrivals being scheduled at the same time.

Air India had, however, recently revealed its tentative Australia schedule where it was planning to operate to Melbourne and Sydney from September with its brand new Boeing 787 Dreamliners. Air India had also factored in a possibility of operating its 777 fleet on these routes.
http://newindianexpress.com/nation/article568032.ece

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