The ferry flight started at Airbus’ delivery centre, Toulouse, on the southern part of the airfield which is reserved only for Airbus’ operations. VT-ATF, taxied out, and took off from runway 14R at Toulouse–Blagnac Airport (LFBO, TLS), at 1626hrsUTC (2156hrs IST) on 21st march, 2014, 9 days after the expected date of ferry. Faced with issues with the DGCA, the ferry flight kept getting delayed: something that went against the spirit of aviation growth in the country, and demonstrated unarguably that even an established player like Air Asia, with the clout of the TATAs, is unable to sail smooth with the India’s DGCA, which was downgraded to category 2 by the FAA recently.

With this delay, commercial scheduled flights at Air Asia India are expected to commence only late May or early June, 2014, as foreseen, today. The airline is yet to obtain its Air Operator Permit (AOP), only after which a schedule will be approved and the sale of tickets may begin.

But the ferry flight was smooth, and without any glitches. The initial leg of the journey was for 03:32hrs, over some 1,500NM (Nautical Miles) from TLS to Ankara’s (Turkey) Esenboğa International Airport (LTAC, ESB), via southern France, northern Italy, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, and finally Bulgaria, arriving at the Turkish city at 1958hrs UTC (0128hrs IST). The one-hour stop at Ankara was only a refueling stop, for the next leg: the 3000-odd NM flight from ESB to Chennai (VOMM, MAA).

At 2117hrs UTC (0247hrs IST), the brand new A320 departed ESB, flying over the north-eastern tip of Syria, through Iraq, avoiding Baghdad, brushing past Kuwait, over the Persian Gulf, overhead Dubai, over the Gulf of Oman, and entering Indian mainland over Maharashtra’s coast, 200km south of Mumbai, and through Bellary in Karnataka, before starting descent from 39,000ft (FL390) to approach and land at Chennai, at 0400hrs UTC (0930hrs IST), with a 0 minute delay. In reality, the actual delay is 9days, 0 minutes. This leg lasted almost 06:30hrs.

In total, the aircraft was in the air for 10 hours from Toulouse to Chennai, and the entire exercise lasted around 11 hours.

The flight had 10 persons on board, in total, all Air Asia employees: 5 pilots, and 5 engineers. Of the 5 pilots, 3 were captains, one from Air Asia Malaysia.

The aircraft was welcomed with a water cannon salute, parked, cleared by customs, and one of the crew members stepped out waving the Indian flag.

A milestone in Indian aviation has been reached. The first airline started with an FDI component has brought its first airplane to the country.

For the complete tracking of the flight, and details, please visit the previous post, by clicking here.