Delhi, June 17: As many as five international flights of Air India - all using the 787-8 Dreamliner were cancelled on Tuesday on security grounds.
The flights were taken back before few minutes to their take off amid increased scrutiny of Boeing's flagship aircraft after the Ahmedabad plane crash that claimed at least 270 lives.
The cancelled services include AI 915 (Delhi-Dubai), AI 153 (Delhi-Vienna), AI 143 (Delhi-Paris), AI 159 (Ahmedabad-London), and AI 170 (London-Amritsar).
Apart from it, a technical issue also affected a Dreamliner operating as AI 315 to Delhi, forcing the pilot to return it to Hong Kong.
And, earlier today, an Air India San Francisco-Mumbai flight suffered a technical snag during a scheduled halt at Kolkata, prompting the airline to deboard all passengers within no time.
Also, two Dreamliners operated by Lufthansa and British Airways - flying from Frankfurt and London to Hyderabad and Chennai - were forced to return to their origins.
Air India said its AI 143 service ran into an issue during pre-flight checks and that was cancelled at the eleventh hour due to restrictions on night-time operations at Paris' Charles de Gaulle airport, that’s the destination.
On cancelling the day's Ahmedabad-London Gatwick service today, the airline cited unavailability of aircraft due to airspace restrictions and additional precautionary checks, following the Ahmedabad mishap.
There was no technical snag in the Dreamliner scheduled to fly the route, the airline cleared.
