IndiGo Brace for 48 More Hours of Flight Disruptions Amid Crew Shortages and New Rules

IndiGo, India's largest domestic airline, has warned passengers of another 48 hours of significant flight disruptions caused by a combination of crew shortages, technical glitches, and new regulatory norms. Since the implementation of updated Flight Duty Time Limitations (FDTL) on November 1, which aimed to enhance safety by restricting pilot flying hours and mandating increased rest periods, IndiGo’s operations have struggled to stabilize across its vast network of over 2,200 daily flights. The airline has now initiated calibrated adjustments to its schedules to contain the ongoing disruption and restore normalcy.

The disruptions over the past two days have led to nearly 200 flight cancellations at major airports including Delhi, Mumbai, Hyderabad, and Bengaluru. IndiGo attributes this turbulence to unforeseen challenges such as acute shortages of pilots and cabin crew, caused by the stricter FDTL rules. Many earlier rosters became invalid as crew members no longer met the revised flight and rest hour criteria, forcing cancellations of entire flight rotations. The new roster rules reduce allowable duty hours, limit night landings from six to two, and require longer rest periods, necessitating more pilots to cover the same schedules—an adjustment IndiGo, with its tight crew utilization and large night-time operations, has found difficult to implement rapidly.

Besides regulatory challenges, technical problems at airports such as Delhi and Pune have further compounded delays, with failures in check-in and departure control systems causing long queues and cascading departure delays. Additionally, winter weather including fog, combined with heavy passenger traffic and peak-hour airport congestion, has put further pressure on IndiGo’s tightly packed schedule. Government data from the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) indicates IndiGo’s on-time performance dropped to 35% recently, suggesting over 1,400 flights experienced delays on a single day in November, with 1,232 flights cancelled across that month.

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While the FDTL norms apply to all airlines, IndiGo has been uniquely impacted due to its sheer scale, frequency of flights, and large overnight schedule that limits crew availability for late hours. Smaller carriers with fewer flights and less dense networks have been able to adjust their rosters more flexibly. IndiGo has detailed plans to gradually stabilize by redeploying crew for high-stress routes, modifying night schedules, and pre-planning selective cancellations to minimize last-minute disruptions.

Passengers flying with IndiGo are advised to regularly check flight status updates and prepare for potential delays or cancellations. The airline has issued an apology for the inconvenience and attributes the unusual operational strain to a "multitude of unforeseen challenges" including the combined effects of technology glitches, seasonal schedule adjustments, weather, congestion, and the enforcement of new crew rostering rules—all aimed ultimately at improving overall flight safety.

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