Vistara has announced that it will add a new destination to its network: Muscat, Oman.
Headed to Muscat
Starting 12th December 2022, Vistara will operate a daily flight between Mumbai’s Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport and Muscat International Airport with the following schedule:
- Mumbai-Muscat
- Departure time: 20:30
- Arrival time: 21:35
- Flight time: 2 hours and 35 minutes
- Flight number: UK233
- Frequency: Daily
- Muscat-Mumbai
- Departure time: 22:55
- Arrival time: 03:10 (the next day)
- Flight time: 2 hours and 45 minutes
- Flight number: UK234
- Frequency: Daily
These flights will be operated by the airline’s Airbus 3-class A320neo aircraft featuring 8 Business Class seats, 24 Premium Economy seats and 132 standard Economy Class seats.
We are excited to expand our presence in the Middle East with the addition of Muscat as the fourth city in the region. Given the strong bilateral ties and the thriving trade and investment relations between India and Oman, this new route will further aid the growing traffic between the two countries. The capital city of Muscat continues to attract a significant number of expats, traders, business travellers, and high-end leisure travellers from India who will now have the choice of flying business class and premium economy on India’s best airline complemented with Vistara’s signature hospitality.
said Vinod Kannan, Chief Executive Officer, Vistara.
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Strong competition
Vistara is entering a crowd market, with four other airlines competing for the market share. Out of the four, three are Indian airlines with two of them being low-cost.
Oman Air, the only Omani carrier operating on the route, flies twice-daily between the two cities. Air India, IndiGo and Go FIRST all fly daily on this route.
Vistara will be the only airline to offer Premium Economy class on this route, a Unique Selling Point (USP) for the airline. The Mumbai-Muscat route sees both business and leisure travellers.
Growing Mumbai hub
Vistara has lately been growing out of Mumbai for international flights. The airline has recently added flights from Mumbai to Abu Dhabi, Jeddah, Bangkok and now Muscat.
Growing out of Mumbai is freeing up crucial slots out of Delhi for the airline. The airline is steadily adding capacity on long-haul routes out of Delhi.
The airline has in the past said that it will look beyond Delhi to grow internationally. Mumbai is the busiest international market after Delhi so it is obvious for an airline to grow out of Mumbai.
Meanwhile, Vistara recently announced new exclusive flights between Pune and Singapore.
Featured image by Hindustan Times
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