Air India’s San Francisco flight will go over Alaska and Russia. (Image: Google Flights)
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced during his recent visit to Silicon Valley that national carrier Air India will begin non-stop service to San Francisco — but from New Delhi, not from India’s tech center of Bengaluru (Bangalore) as initially reported.
The carrier will use a 777-200LR for the 16-hour, 7,670-mile journey. It will begin December 2, and will operate three days a week (Wednesday, Friday and Sunday). The aircraft will have eight first class seats, 35 in business class and 195 in economy.
Roundtrip fares will be about $1,600 in economy and $4,300 in business class — or if you want to go in luxury, $12,000 in first class. The flight from San Francisco will operate westbound, following a polar route over Alaska.
Business class on Air India Boeing 777-200 (Photo: Nisarg Vyas – Wikimedia Commons)
Air India said the San Francisco-New Delhi flight will provide easy connections to nine other cities, including Bengaluru, Mumbai, Chennai, Kolkata, Hyderabad, Kochi, Ahmedabad, Pune and Bhubaneswar.
Because the routing takes the flight to New Delhi in northern India instead of Bengaluru in the south, it won’t be the world’s longest non-stop. That title will go to Emirates’ planned new 8,580-mile route from Dubai to Panama City, which is due to begin in February.
According to Wikipedia, the longest current non-stops from San Francisco are Etihad’s 8,158-mile flight to Abu Dhabi and Emirates’ 8,103-mile routing to Dubai– both clocking in just under 16 hours.
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No, it won’t be, because SFO-Dubai is farther, and Emirates already operates that (and has for years). The fact that they chose to go to Delhi instead of Bangalore makes all the difference, because Bangalore is about 1000 miles farther. Delhi makes a lot more sense, too, for connecting traffic.
Question is: will Air India actually have the equipment to operate this route? In the last few years half their aircraft have been repossessed by the banks.
Perhaps if this route is successful Air India might actually have the money to meet payroll for a change.
Chris: December comes before February 🙂 This WILL be the world’s longest flight for a few months!