Vistara – the joint venture from TATA Group and Singapore Airlines, is launching flights to Paris from New Delhi. The flights will be operated by B787-9 Dreamliner aircraft, two of which are part of its fleet currently with four more on order. Flights are effective November 07, 2021 and will operate on Wednesdays and Sundays. Schedule has been published for the flights until February 13, 2022. The schedule is as below
UK21 DEL1345 – 1840CDG
UK22 CDG2145 – 1030(+1)DEL
Vistara’s widebody journey has been full of bottlenecks. The airline inducted its first Dreamliner in February 2020, just days ahead of the world going into a lockdown due to the pandemic. Yet, the airline has made the most of opportunities on offer. Vistara launched flights to London, operating from London Heathrow – something which this website had predicted. This was followed up with flights to Frankfurt and Tokyo with the Dreamliner.
France is one of the 16 countries in the EU which allows Indians vaccinated with Covishield to travel. However, requirements change often and vaccination is often combined with the need for a negative RT-PCR before traveling. It is prudent to check for the latest guidelines before travel.
Widebody utilisation
Currently the airline is utilising its two B787-9 aircraft for five weekly services between Delhi and London, twice a week service to Frankfurt from Delhi and once a week service to Tokyo Haneda from Delhi.
Two of the airlines’ aircraft are in storage awaiting delivery. The airline has recently been granted US-DOT approval for flights to the USA.
Network Thoughts
France is one of the 28 countries with which India has an air bubble agreement. There have been murmurs of the country opening up tourist visas again and that could mean some positive development on the air traffic numbers.
Currently Air France is operating four times a week to Delhi from Paris while Air India is operating thrice a week. While Air France is deploying the Airbus A359, Air India is operating the B787 Dreamliner.
The Delhi – Paris sector ranks amongst top five for Origin – Destination traffic from Delhi and Vistara will look at establishing itself in current times to ensure that it gains significant share of the market in future. By the time we are on the other side of the pandemic, Vistara might well have Air India as its sibling – going by the pace at which Air India privatisation is headed and the likelihood of TATA acquiring the national carrier.
At 6579 kilometers, Delhi – Paris remains out of future competition from A321XLR and more so due to current geopolitical challenges like airspace usage over Afghanistan! While the other destinations which the airline has have its codeshare partners – British Airways at London, Lufthansa at Frankfurt and JAL at Tokyo, with Air France – the airline has an interline agreement. All of this has little value during the pandemic!
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