Singapore Airlines’ Airbus A380 Is Back In Mumbai

Among the many aircraft that Singapore Airlines sends to destinations in India, the Airbus A380 has often featured in its services to New Delhi and Mumbai. However, for a couple of months this year, the superjumbo was swapped with the Boeing 777 for flights to Mumbai. But starting this month, the double-decker plane is back to serving the Singapore-Mumbai-Singapore route.

Back in Mumbai

Singapore Airlines’ (SIA) Airbus A380 service to Mumbai has followed a curious trend this year. For starters, the carrier has two daily flights to Mumbai – one with an Airbus A350 and the other with A380 (currently flight SQ424 from Singapore to Mumbai) – along with an additional A350 service every Friday and Saturday.

Data from Cirium shows that From January to May, the airline had a daily A380 service between the two destinations. But that began to change in June when almost half of those flights were performed by a Boeing 777-300ER.

Photo: Bradley Caslin I Shutterstock

By July, the 777 had completely replaced the A380 for operational reasons known only to Singapore Airlines, and this trend continued in August as well. But fans of the A380 didn’t have to wait too long as the carrier brought back the superjumbo in Mumbai on September 1st after a two-month break. Data shows that the A380, in fact, will continue to serve Mumbai well into the next year.

Flights to India

Singapore Airlines has an extensive network in India. The airline deploys a mixed fleet of Airbus A380, A350, Boeing 737 MAX 8, and Boeing 787-10 to cities including Ahmedabad, Bengaluru, Mumbai, Kolkata, Kochi, Delhi, Hyderabad, and Chennai.

Among these, Delhi and Mumbai are the only ones that are served by the A380. In September alone, Singapore Airlines has a total of 820 scheduled return flights to various destinations in India. This figure increases even further to more than 1,000 when flights from SIA’s low-cost subsidiary Scoot are added to it.

Recent growth

Singapore Airlines was one of the most affected airlines during the COVID pandemic, as its business model depends on international travel. But strong travel demand in the last few months has improved its figures significantly.

In July, it achieved a load factor of 89% during the peak summer travel season. SIA and Scoot carried over three million passengers that month, with SIA alone carrying 1.94 million passengers, up over 30% from last year.

Photo: WeChitra/Shutterstock

The rebound in travel was also reflected in the airline’s balance sheet, with the carrier reporting a record net profit of S$734 million ($551.51 million) for the first quarter ended June 30th this year. This was a significant increase of 98.4% from what it made during the same period in the previous financial year.

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