Hi, has anyone flown on AIR INDIA before? They have a non-stop service from Newark (New York) to Paris (EWR ~ CDG).

Are they reliable? Are they affiliated with any other airlines? ie. if for whatever reason, their flight got cancel, that I can fly with one of their "partner" airlines.

Would appreciate comments from anyone who has used their service. Thanks!!

Yes I have and I had two flights that were on time with excellent service: JFK to Mumbai and Mumbai to Bangkok.

Mrs C-S did recently, and had two important insights.

The food was awful. She insisted on getting proper (ie Indian) food and found it was just passable: about the standard of a 1960 boil in the bag Vesta curry. But the Western stuff was dire.

On the westbound flight, most passengers had been on since Bombay, and there were an AWFUL lot of children. So the transatlantic bit was pretty noisy and crotchetty.

I wouldn't worry too much about alliances. If things go wrong, in my experience, airlines either leave you to your own devices till they've fixed it themselves, or move you onto any other airline (partner or not) with room. I've had all sorts of experiences with messed-up flights: I've never been transferred to a partner. And, FWIW, our family has been let down more spectacularly by Virgin and BA than we've ever been by AI.

I've flown Air India between Paris and New York. This was the Mumbai flight with a stop in Paris. On the plus side, there were few people boarding in Paris, so the boarding went quickly. The Indian-food meal, optional, I believe, was truly banal but since I don't often have Indian food, it did not trouble me much. The plane clearly was old, but this is a national airline, India's pride is at stake, and I expect the planes are well-maintained. Recently, Air India made a large purchase of planes but I doubt these are in service yet.

Last year we flew Air India to Dehli with a stop in London. It was wall to wall people. Plane was dirty. We weren't allowed deplane when it was vacuumed in London. Vegetarian food was very good.It was 3 hours late.

i haven't. and i usually never say anything bad about an airline, but...
don't travel on air india. some descriptions i've heard are "chaotic", "zoo", etc...etc... any other airline transatlantic will do. you won't be sorry.

If you knew how old some of the planes flying on US-based airlines are and based your decision to fly solely on that you'd never leave the ground.

Air India bought four 777s from UA last year, but CDG-EWR is on a 747. At least in the current schedule.

Their 13 747-400s were made between 1989 and 1996. The 6 newer ones were delivered new, while 7 older were 2nd hand from Korean Airlines, Singapore Airlines and Air Canada.

They're older than the 777s used by many carriers across the Atlantic, but are newer than some 767s and definitely newer than NW's DC-10.

We flew AI from JFK to New Delhi with a stop in London round trip in late 2004. The aircraft was old and shopworn, but the aircrew treated us well. We had no luggage problems. The booking was made by our tour operator, so we had no choice. In London, there was a very rapid cleaning by a well-trained British crew. This took place both going and returning. Otherwise, a very unmemorable pair of flights -- which is what we wanted, of course.

Flew AI twice. Chicago to Frankfurt both times. The tickets under $500. Eastbound was packed. Couldn't eat the food on the first flight had our own food for the second flight. Would fly them again. Looking right now for tickets in May.

Disclosure: Have not flown on Air India.

Reason: Turned off by reports of rats on the planes in the late '80s or early '90s.

Probably unfair and maybe 50% urban legend (but not 100% - there were real cases, but I'm led to believe that this has happened on other airlines too) but just how much do I need to save in order to ignore it?

I haven'y flown Air India but a close friend was a TSA Agent at Newark. I'm sure what I'm about to say isn't politically correct, but she told me the TSA agents hated when these planes landed as many passangers did not use deoderant.

Margaret, you're gonna get flamed, but I know what you mean. I worked at Dulles airport for Pan Am. None of us wanted to work Pan Am 66 flying to London then on to Delhi. Always crowded, lots of bratty kids, very belligerent passengers (mostly Indian diplomats and wealthy families) and tons and tons of baggage. Folks returning to India filled their bags way past the 66lb. limit and usually had multiple bags. Many duct taped cardboard boxes full of American goods hoping we'd let them get away with it. We often did but on full flights we had to enforce the rules. And those people didn't believe in having rules. I suppose the caste system led them to believe we peons working in the airport didn't know squat which "entitled" them to treat us like dirt.

When Pan Am 67 came back to IAD, it was the absolute dirtiest flight we had to handle. An absolute mess. The baggage that came back reeked of curry and sweat. And again, the passengers were very surly. It was very hard trying to handle their problems with connections or lost baggage when they instantly treated you like something inferior. That's about the only thing I don't miss about the old days at Pan Am.

The only thing that I could imagine being worse would be an Air India flight. No Thanks.

Thanks for all your comments. I get a sense that the feedbacks are more negative than positive. It's very unfortunate, as their prices look really attractive...

Sizzy - Their prices are really attractive <b>because</b> they have negative reputations and many people avoid them. If they're good, then the fares won't be that low.

&quot;There is hardly anything in this world that some man cannot make of poorer quality and thus sell for less. The person who judges by price alone is that man's lawful prey.&quot;