Vistara Crisis: The Tata Group airline, Vistara, announced on Sunday that it will be cutting down its operational capacity by 10 per cent, reducing about 25-30 flights on a daily basis, in order to solve its crew crisis. The carrier has been recently struggling due to mass flight cancellations caused as a result of several first officers calling in sick as a protest against the airline’s pay policies and roster schedules.
The airline informed that it will be reducing its daily flight load and most of the cancellations will be in the domestic network, reported PTI. The carrier is to operate about 300 flights daily in the current summer schedule. “We are carefully scaling back our operations by around 25-30 flights per day, i.e. roughly 10 per cent of the capacity we were operating. This will take us back to the same level of flight operations as at the end of February 2024, and provide the much-needed resilience and buffer in the rosters,” it said in an official statement.
The airline affirmed that the cancellations will be done well in advance to minimise any inconvenience caused to the customers. It stressed that the on time performance of the flights have improved and ‘all the affected passengers have already been re-accommodated on other flights, as applicable’.
The carrier stated that it remained optimistic about conducting stable operations in April and beyond. However, the overall capacity will be further impacted by these cancellations and could lead to a surge in air fares on certain routes amidst rising domestic air passenger traffic and a lack of services.
Earlier on Friday, CEO Vinod Kanna, attributed the recent disruptions to a ‘stretched roster’. The carrier employs about 6,500 people, out of which nearly 1,000 are pilots. After the airline cancelled flights due to the non-availability of crew earlier in the month, the aviation watchdog, DGCA, called on Vistara to provide a daily report regarding cancellations and delays.
Kannan also noted that the airline is looking into reviewing the current rostering system and is engaging in discussions with pilots to seek suggestions for changs. The executive stressed that the airline has not witnessed any unusual increase in attrition.