Starting this July, the Indian budget airline IndiGo will fly to two European destinations, each three times a week with a leased Boeing 787.
IndiGo has officially announced the commencement of scheduled services to Amsterdam and Manchester. It is still unclear from which Indian airport the flights will be operated, Delhi Airport is most likely however. That destination is already served from Schiphol by KLM and Air India. Four leased Boeing 787-9s will be used on the route to the Netherlands and the United Kingdom. The company is leasing the aircraft, including crew, – a so-called wet lease – from Norse Atlantic.
The news doesn’t entirely come as a surprise. Before COVID the airline had already been planning commencing flights to Europe. However, in January it became definite that the airline, which has been led by from KLM-CEO Pieter Elbers for several years, wanted to start flights to Amsterdam this year. When IndiGo wanted to start the route was still unknown at that time. The company was still looking for staff at Schiphol, Paris Charles de Gaulle and London Heathrow.
Intercontinental
IndiGo has been working on intercontinental expansion for some time. The airline currently flies a Boeing 777-300ER leased from Turkish Airlines between Delhi and Istanbul. Last April, the company placed an order for thirty Airbus A350s, with an option for another seventy. However, these aircraft will not be delivered before 2027.