Jet Airways set to fly again, DGCA grants AOC approval after proving flights

DGCA has granted the air operator certificate to Jet Airways allowing the airline to resume commercial flight operations after a hiatus of nearly three years.

Jet Airways had successfully completed proving flights on May 17 and was awaiting the air operator certificate (AOC) from DGCA, according to its owner Jalan-Kalrock Consortium.

According to sources quoted by PTI, the airline completed its second and final proving flight with 31 people on board, including officials from the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA).

Proving flights required at least five landings to be done by the aircraft successfully to obtain the AOC.

The two proving flights on Tuesday were conducted on Delhi-Hyderabad and Hyderabad-Delhi routes using the carrier’s Boeing 737 plane, the sources said.

The three proving flights that were conducted on Sunday were on Delhi-Mumbai, Mumbai-Ahmedabad, Ahmedabad-Delhi routes using the same plane, they noted.

Proving flights completed? Check ✅#TheJoyIsComingBack pic.twitter.com/6GJM1ORJQE

— Jet Airways (@jetairways) May 17, 2022

“We have successfully conducted our proving flights over two days, and we now look forward to the grant of the AOC by the DGCA,” spokesperson of Jalan-Kalrock Consortium said on May 17.

The airline earlier owned by Naresh Goyal had operated its last flight on April 17, 2019. It had run into huge debt and was unable to pay off the loans. After years of bankruptcy proceedings in NCLT, it was acquired by a consortium of UAE-based businessman Murari Jalan and the UK-based Kalrock Capital which committed to funding $180 million, of which $60 million was to be for repaying dues.

The airline intends to restart commercial flight operations in the July-September quarter. Last month, the airline appointed industry veteran Sanjiv Kapoor, former chief strategy and commercial officer at Vistara, as its CEO.

Kapoor had recently said that Jet Airways will have the best possible app, website, and IT systems and services among all Indian carriers but it won’t let go off the human touch.

“Human interaction cannot be fully replaced by technology — it must always be there as a backup, especially when things go wrong (during irregular operations, etc),” he stated in an email to employees.