COVID-19: Vistara suspends international operations till March 31

After GoAir, Vistara has announced that it is temporarily suspending its international flight operations from March 20 to March 31 amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

Vistara said in a statement that the decision was taken due to the unprecedented impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on border control and air travel across the world.

The airline has also temporarily adjusted domestic capacity for the months of March and April 2020 in view of reduced demand.

“Customers booked on the affected flights will be fully refunded. The airline will continue to monitor the evolving situation and may make further capacity adjustments, if required,” a Vistara spokesperson said.

Vistara currently has international flights to Sri Lanka, Singapore, Dubai, Bangkok.

This comes after GoAir announced that it is temporarily suspending its international operations till April 15 as air travel took a hit due to coronavirus.

The airline has also initiated a temporary rotational leave without pay policy. The company claims this will not only help it counter the short-term reduction in capacity but will also ensure that a cross section of its employees stay away from the workplace to ensure business continuity.

“Despite going over and above to implement these safeguards, the sharp decline in air travel that we are currently experiencing is unprecedented,” GoAir said in a statement.

IndiGo announced on Tuesday that it is cancelling its flight operations to Turkey and Malaysia after the government’s advisory restrict international traffic from these countries. The airline will cancel its services between Delhi-Istanbul and Chennai-Kuala Lumpur from March 18, 2020 until March 31, 2020. 

"The airline has already cancelled flights between Bangalore-Kuala Lumpur until March 31, 2020 and Delhi-Kuala Lumpur until April 30, 2020," IndiGo said in a statement.