A year after Jet Airways grounding, wishes to go back in time, hopes of revival dot the firmament


As the grounding of the cash-starved Jet Airways nears one year, many dreams have been shattered but there is optimism of an insolvency resolution-led new birth



"Wish I could go back in time", yearns a pilot who was in the cockpit of a Jet Airways plane that landed little past midnight at Mumbai airport on April 18, 2019. Not many thought it will be the last flight of the once-storied carrier, where scores of pilots and other staff served for at least two decades.

As the grounding of the cash-starved Jet Airways nears one year, many dreams have been shattered but there is optimism of an insolvency resolution-led new birth.

The airline announced temporary suspension of services on April 17 last year and the last flight S2-3502 that took off from Amristar at around 10:30 pm touched down at Mumbai's Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport at 12:22 am on April 18.

Jet Airways' low-cost arm JetLite operated the flight with a Boeing 737-800 aircraft, which was later taken on lease by no-frills airline SpiceJet.

From a sense of belonging to disbelief to lingering hopes of revival, a few former staff spoke to have myriad emotions when they recalled Jet Airways days.

For Nidhi Chaphekar, the Jet Airways cabin crew member who was injured in a terror attack at Brussels airport in 2016, the closure of the airline is more tough than the terror incident.


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