Historic non-stop flight from San Francisco lands in Bengaluru with all-women cockpit crew

Creating aviation history of sorts, an all-women cockpit crew piloted the first non-stop San Francisco-Bengaluru flight, landing the Air India plane with 238 passengers at the Kempegowda International Airport (KIA) here early on Monday.

The 17-hour journey in the skies, the longest non-stop route to an Indian city, ended in jubilation as the Air India flight (AI 176) touched down at 3.07 am. The flight had taken off from San Francisco at 8.30 pm, local time.

Flying over the North Pole, this is also, arguably, the second-longest route in the world for a commercial flight. The landmark flight spanned a distance of 13,993 kms, linking two tech hubs located diametrically at opposite ends of the world with a time zone change of about 13.5 hours.