From Mumbai to Newark: Air India's Boeing 777 flies non-stop, but without baggage

MUMBAI: For over a week, Air India's Boeing 777 aircraft that travels 12,500km from Mumbai to Newark in the US non-stop in over 15 hours has been forced to fly lighter because the monsoon weather conditions and obstacles near the airport would have otherwise made the takeoff roll and subsequent climb of this super heavy plane unsafe.

Unknown to passengers, AI has been leaving behind a large number of checked-in bags to lighten the aircraft. In a week, 84 tonnes of luggage had been left behind. On Friday's Mumbai-Newark flight 191, the airline carried 50 tonnes of such bags by reducing the quantity of fuel. A stopover had to be scheduled at Frankfurt, where the plane refuelled, and continued onwards to Newark.

"Since the last one week, there's been a crowd of disgruntled AI passengers in the customs area in Newark arguing with the airline staff, waiting to file missing baggage complaints," said an airline official. As per the norms, AI has to deliver each of these bags to the passengers' addresses in the US, apart from paying them a financial compensation for purchase of basic clothing and toiletries.




The airline might end up spending Rs 16,000 to Rs 32,000 per passenger, estimated an official. The loss-making national carrier is in the midst of a bailout programme after the government approved a Rs 30,000-crore package to rescue the airline in April 2012.

"Due to payload restrictions on account of weather issues, the baggage was left behind. Around 85 per cent of the baggage has been sent and the balance is being sent in a day or two," the airline said in a statement.

On Friday , out of the 35 containers of bags left behind at Mumbai airport, 26 containers, amounting to about 50 tonnes, were carried onboard the Mumbai-FrankfurtNewark flight, said an official.

Because of the quantity of fuel that needs to be carried, the AI's ultra-long haul flight 191 is arguably the heaviest passenger aircraft that lifts out of Mumbai airport. Mumbai-Newark is the twenty third longest, non-stop flight operated in the world, but unlike AI 191, the ultra-long haul flights operated by airlines like Qantas, Etihad, Emirates, etc which lift off runways in Sydney, Doha, Dubai do not suffer payload restrictions. And here's why .

To operate the non-stop Mumbai-Newark flight, the 342-seater AI Boeing 777-300 ER carries over 130 tonnes of fuel, the approximate weight of 26 Asian elephants. For the AI Boeing 777, the maximum permissible take-off weight (MTOW) is 351 tonnes. MTOW calculations ensure that an aircraft is not too heavy and will be able to turn and make a safe landing soon after takeoff in case of an emergency."Due to weather conditions, obstacles around the airport and the comparatively shorter length of its runway , for a safe takeoff from Mumbai air port, the MTOW gets capped at 340-345 tonnes," said a senior Boeing 777 commander.

In August, flights to the US fly full and that's where the offloading of bags and passengers come in. Among the weather conditions that decide MTOW are wind direction and velocity , atmospheric pressure, temperature and runway surface condition. That's why during the monsoon and winter months, when tailwinds (wind blowing from behind the aircraft. Headwinds are ideal for takeoff) lash runway 27 of Mumbai airport, every night, the AI officials sit down to calculate how many passengers or bags should be offloaded to keep within MTOW limits. "For every one millibar drop in atmospheric pressure, the MTOW goes down by about 400 kg. Similarly , if tailwinds go up to 9.2 kmph, the aircraft has to lose up to 5,000 kg of weight if it has to operate from a wet runway ," the commander added.

All these effects would have been negated had the Mumbai airport runway been longer like the ones in Singapore, Sydney etc. The heavier an aircraft, the longer the length of runway it needs to be airborne. It also climbs slowly and so needs a fairly obstacle-free course beyond the runway , all of which are not provided by the 12,008feet runway 27 of the spacestarved Mumbai airport.

But then again, United Airlines too operates MumbaiNewark direct flights using Boeing 777-200 ER aircraft and they have not had such severe payload restrictions. "Unlike AI which allows two free check-in bags of 23kg each for economy class, United only allows one free bag. United has lesser seats than AI, it does not carry as much cargo too and so flies a lighter aircraft. AI carries about 30 tonnes of cargo per flight. AI won't offload cargo, as it contains perishables, but more importantly, the airline makes its money there," said an airline official.

10 AI cabin crew made to work for all 17 hours of long-haul flight

AI operated Friday's Mumbai-Frankfurt-Newark flight with three sets of cockpit crew, that is, six pilots but with only one set of cabin crew, that is, 10 flight attendants. While the three sets of pilots took turns to operate the flight that took over 17 hours to reach Newark, the 10 cabin crew were forced to be on duty during the entire duration of the flight. The airline got a dispensation from the DGCA to do so. Had the 10-door Boeing 777 aircraft met with an emergency on landing in Newark, it would have been the job of the 10 severely fatigued cabin crew to save the lives of the 335 passengers onboard. The DGCA chief was not available for comment.