Pak airspace opens, first plane to fly is an Air India
Air India San Francisco-Delhi service AI 184 was winging its way to Delhi when the pilots of this flight — one of the longest nonstops globally — got a surprise message on Tuesday morning: “Pakistan airspace open for overflying.”
AI, which has been losing crores daily due to the airspace closure since February 27 and its flights to and from the west taking long routes, acted swiftly.
The flight from the Golden Gate became the first by an Indian carrier to fly over the newly-opened gates of Pakistan airspace on its way to Delhi after 4 am on Tuesday.
“The flight landed here about 1.5 hours before the schedule time that the longer route would have taken,” said an official.
