Jet Airways on Sunday conducted the first set of three proving flights with 18 people, including officials of the aviation regulator DGCA, on board the aircraft, sources said. The second set of two proving flights will be operated by Jet Airways on Tuesday, they said.
Proving flights is the last step for the airline to obtain the air operator certificate (AOC).
The first of the three proving flights was conducted on the Delhi-Mumbai route, sources said.
The second flight was scheduled to return to Delhi, but after it departed from Mumbai, officials of the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) asked the pilots to divert it to Ahmedabad, they said.
The DGCA diverts aircraft during proving flights to test the readiness of a new airline in handling such situations, they said.
The second flight safely landed in Ahmedabad, and sometime after that, the third flight was conducted on the Ahmedabad-Delhi route, they mentioned.
The aircraft used for these three proving flights was a Boeing 737 plane with registration number VT-SXE of Jet Airways, they said.
There were 18 people — four cabin crew members, two pilots, and 12 others, including DGCA officials and senior executives of Jet Airways — on board the plane during these three proving flights, sources said.
A total of five landings (five flights) have to be done by the aircraft to successfully complete its proving flights, they said.
Three landings were conducted on Sunday, and therefore, the remaining two will be conducted on Tuesday, they said.
Jet Airways did not respond to PTI’s request for a statement on the matter of its proving flights.
Jet Airways had on May 5 conducted its test flight to and from Hyderabad in a step towards obtaining the AOC.
The airline in its old avatar was owned by Naresh Goyal and had operated its last flight on April 17, 2019. The Jalan-Kalrock Consortium is currently the promoter of Jet Airways.
The airline plans to restart commercial flight operations in July-September quarter this year.
