Explained | What India’s ban on UK flights means for passengers and airlines

India joined many other countries notably the Netherlands, Belgium, Kuwait, France, Latvia, Austria, Italy and many others to impose restrictions on flights to the United Kingdom. This comes amidst the declaration by British authorities that they have found a new strain of COVID-19 which is leading to the sudden spike in cases in the United Kingdom.

The new restrictions mean that there won't be any flights between the two countries starting December 22 until the end of the year.

Currently British Airways, Virgin Atlantic, Air India and Vistara operate flights between the two countries. SpiceJet was to start operations in this month—which the airline deferred indefinitely citing a lockdown which ended before the airline was to launch its services.

While India and the United Kingdom have an open skies agreement in place which puts restrictions only on flights between London Heathrow to Mumbai and Delhi, allowing all other city and airport pairs to offer unlimited services, the current operations are under the air bubble arrangement. London Heathrow has been a mega hub and every Indian carrier which had widebody aircraft in its fleet has flown to Heathrow. Air bubble restricted the operations to Origin - Destination traffic only and not allowing airlines to carry Indian nationals as sixth freedom traffic beyond the UK. Incidentally, these restrictions were relaxed a few days ago!

Current Services and what it means for passengers

What does the flight ban mean for passengers? As of December 20, there were 12 flights a week between Mumbai and London. Five operated by British Airways, three by Virgin Atlantic and four by Air India. Vistara is scheduled to launch operations from January 16, 2021.

The busier Delhi- London Heathrow sector had 21 weekly flights. Seven weekly flights by Air India, five by Vistara, six by British Airways and Four by Virgin Atlantic.

London is currently connected with Bengaluru with six flights per week, Hyderabad with five flights per week, Chennai with four flights a week, Kochi with thrice weekly flights, Ahmedabad and Goa with twice a week flights each, Amritsar with a weekly flight.

Air India also operates to Birmingham from Delhi and Amritsar.

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Impact

The highest impact could well be for Vistara. London Heathrow is the airline's sole destination with its widebody B787-9 Dreamliner aircraft, two of which are part of its fleet. The airline has six on order and has pushed deliveries of at least one due to the pandemic.

Virgin Atlantic was due to start services to Manchester from Delhi and Mumbai which have been put on hold as the airline said that it's new route launches are on hold indefinitely. A cut to its existing flights to Mumbai and Delhi from Heathrow would further scale down its overall network.

British Airways has been impacted the most as country after country put in restrictions on travel to and from the United Kingdom. Both British Airways and Virgin Atlantic have significantly scaled down its fleet during the pandemic with Virgin retiring the A340 and B747-400, while British Airways retired the B747-400 and parked most of its A380 fleet.

Air India had the widest network on offer currently between India and the United Kingdom. Air India would merely get a breather of sorts as it continues to fly under the air bubble and charts forward with the Vande Bharat mission flying to destinations hitherto not served. However, data released by MoCA shows that there have been good loads on Air India flights between India and London.

What next?

The more things move towards normalisation, the more complicated they have become this year. Just a couple of days ago the United Kingdom was in the news for administering the first dose of vaccine for COVID-19. This was followed by the start of vaccinations in the United States. Various vaccines, including the one jointly developed by University of Oxford are in final stages of approval.

Countries in the European Union are tackling another wave with lockdowns and other measures, however with the news of a new strain things become complicated for the UK and the world!

Will the vaccine cover the new strain, how potent is the new strain? Is the virus mutating fast? These questions may not have immediate answers but the answers would determine the fate of the air connectivity not just between India and the UK but also to other parts of the world.

In the early months of this year, most countries relied on temperature checks before allowing passengers to enter. Soon, it was known that symptoms may develop over a period of time which led to quarantine rules. With the new strain and its potential to spread, it is a case of once bitten, twice shy.

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