Vistara faces deeper pilot crisis, dozens of flights cancelled nationwide
PTC News Desk: The Vistara airline found itself grappling with a severe pilot shortage, resulting in the cancellation of at least 38 flights across major cities in India this morning. Among the affected flights were 15 departures from Mumbai, 12 from Delhi, and 11 from Bengaluru, exacerbating the travel woes of passengers relying on the carrier's services.
This escalation follows yesterday's cancellation of 50 Vistara flights, with an additional 160 experiencing delays. Disgruntled passengers, voicing their frustration to NDTV, lamented the airline's lack of effective communication and enduring lengthy waits at airports, lambasting Vistara for the ordeal.
In response to the crisis, Vistara issued a statement acknowledging the "significant number" of flight disruptions over recent days, attributing them to various factors, including crew shortages.
"We acknowledge and are deeply concerned about the inconvenience this has caused to our customers. Having said that, our teams are working towards minimising the discomfort to the customers," the statement read.
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To mitigate the impact, Vistara announced temporary adjustments to its flight operations, ensuring adequate network connectivity. The airline disclosed plans to scale back the number of flights temporarily while deploying larger aircraft such as the B787-9 Dreamliner and A321neo on select domestic routes to accommodate more passengers. Additionally, Vistara committed to offering affected customers alternate flight options or refunds as applicable.
"We understand that these disruptions have caused immense discomfort to our customers and sincerely apologise to them for the same. We are working towards stabilising the situation and will resume operating our regular capacity very soon," the statement assured.
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(Inputs from agencies)