Exodus At Air India: Close To 120 Experienced First Officers Quit In Preceding 4 Months, Says Report

Around 120 First Officers of A320 aircraft of Air India, with over 3000 hours of flight experience, have resigned in the last 3-4 months from the national carrier, reports Times Of India

All these officers who have tendered their resignations are now serving their six-month notice period. Though, the exit of so many officers have not impacted the flight operations of the national carrier, as it has surplus numbers of first officers, but it is a cause of concern for the airline.

“These first officers were taken on a five-year fixed term contract. Most of them joined with only about 250 hours of flying experience, but they quit with 3,000 hours or so. The cost to AI is that of experienced crew leaving as the airline took so much effort to bring them up to a certain level,” a source was quoted in the report as saying.

“We’ve been feeling bad, all the good guys are leaving. We’ve spent time training them,” a senior commander said.

Air India spokesperson confirmed the resignations but refused to give a number. The spokesperson said, “Few first officers have resigned in the past months. They were on contract," said the airline spokesperson.

According to an AI official, the airline has about 2,000 on-contract A320 first officers.

“We have a surplus of first officers and so the resignations haven’t hit our operations,” the official added.