National carrier Air India, and Air Austral have signed a free flow code share agreement, enabling Air India to code share on Air Austral-operated flights on the Chennai-Reunion-Chennai sector as well as beyond Reunion to/from Johannesburg, Seychelles, Mauritius and Madagascar. Reciprocally, Air Austral will put its marketing code on Air India operated flights beyond Chennai to/from Mumbai, Delhi and Kochi.
Air India will offer its passengers flights departing from India to Saint-Denis de La Réunion via Chennai with the Chennai/Saint-Denis flight operated by Air Austral. Air India passengers will be able to connect in Saint-Denis on flights beyond to/from Johannesburg, Seychelles, Mauritius and Madagascar operated by Air Austral.
Air Austral will offer its customers flights from Reunion to Chennai and beyond to/from Mumbai, New Delhi and Kochi on flights operated by Air India. Air Austral has been operating on the Reunion Island-Chennai-Bangkok route since February 2013. From the beginning of November 2016, Bangkok will be discontinued, leaving all the capacity available to the Reunion Island-Chennai service. The code share has been initially implemented on the Reunion-Chennai-Reunion sector. Code share on the other sectors is likely to be implemented subsequently.
“This agreement will enable Air India to reach out to destinations in the Indian Ocean and Africa. We look forward to expand our relationship with Air Austral in future. Air India already has code share partnerships with 14 other airlines across the globe and Air Austral will be the 15th code share partner of Air India,” said Seema Srivastava, executive director – strategy and planning, Air India.
“Air Austral is pleased with this partnership which offers new Indian Ocean development opportunities from Reunion’s Roland Garros airport. It reflects our commitment to co-operate with airline partners in the region in order to enhance our customer offerings. With Air India, we will offer an increase of choice of destinations in India for our passengers and the connectivity of Reunion Island to the Indian Ocean will be greatly improved,” added Jean-Marc Grazzini, executive vice president – commercial division, Air Austral.
