Air India is launching new long-haul services from Mumbai to New York, Paris and Frankfurt and resuming several routes to European cities from February. The carrier says it will commence daily flights to New York JFK from 14 February using Boeing 777-200LRs. New flights to Paris and Frankfurt will begin next quarter, operating three and four times a week, respectively. The Mumbai-New York service will complement Air India's existing daily service from Delhi to New York JFK and four weekly flights to Newark Liberty airport. This takes Air India's India-USA frequency to 47 nonstop flights per week, it adds. Air India is also resuming nonstop flights connecting Delhi with Copenhagen, Milan and Vienna. Flights to Milan will be operated four times a week from 1 February, while thrice-weekly flights to Vienna and Copenhagen will resume from 18 February and 1 March, respectively. This expansion comes as the airline "continues to make progress in augmenting its fleet with newly-leased aircraft" and return existing aircraft to service. These long-haul routes will be operated by 787-8s that have 18 business class and 238 economy class seats. With the resumption of these flights, Air India will serve seven cities in Europe with 79 weekly non-stop flights: 48 to the UK and 31 to Continental Europe.

Tokyo Narita airport handled 1.66 million passengers in October, a figure up 209% year on year. The number of international passengers grew by 517% to nearly 1.04 million, while the number of domestic passengers increased by 68% to almost 618,900, operator Narita International Airport discloses. Total aircraft movements increased 26% to 15,030. The airport handled over 191,500t of international cargo during the month, down 17% year on year.

Airbus teams in France and Germany have completed the company's first liquid hydrogen fuel tank prototype as part of an effort to mature technology for planned test flights with a partially hydrogen-powered demonstrator aircraft in 2026. The European airframer notes that the fuel tank prototype was built in the record time of just over a year, following the establishment of zero emission development centres (ZEDCs) at the company's sites in Nantes in France and Bremen, Germany, in 2021. Airbus subsequently established a ZEDC in Madrid, to develop composite-based liquid hydrogen fuel tanks, and involved an existing composite centre in Stade, near Hamburg, in Germany, in the effort. At Nantes, a facility which Airbus describes as a "reference shop" for aluminium structures, the team manufactured the storage tank capable of keeping hydrogen at -253°C. The Bremen ZEDC produced what Airbus terms a “coldbox” – ancillary systems to fill and ventilate the tank and distribute the hydrogen, via gasification. Experience with hydrogen at Bremen, through the site's involvement in space activities including the Ariane rocket, was a reason to locate the coldbox development there, Airbus notes. The fuel tank was designed at the airframer's Toulouse headquarters, while the Nantes and Bremen sites concentrated on the manufacturing. Airbus highlights its adoption of a "co-development approach" whereby prototype-building plays a central role in the design process. "Teams get straight into manufacturing a prototype, which they test and learn from before developing an improved prototype, rather than spending a lot of time working on theoretical plans," the airframer says. "It's a real testament to the teamwork across our sites to see this first tank being manufactured so quickly. The agile methodology has delivered a great prototype and will help drive improvements in future iterations," states Chris Redfern, head of manufacturing ZEROe aircraft and head of industrial architects propulsion systems. The first prototype fuel-tank is being tested with nitrogen, rather than hydrogen. But work is underway to build a second prototype that will be filled with hydrogen. Airbus says it has "plenty of feedback" from the initial specimen that will feed into the second, which will take a year to build. "We're looking in particular at maximising space, improving performance and simplifying the manufacturing process," the airframer says. It plans to build a total three prototypes for ground-tests, before a flyable systems will be developed. In February, Airbus and CFM International disclosed a plan to trial a hydrogen-powered demonstrator turbofan in flight tests onboard a modified A380 between 2026 and 2028. The project is part of Airbus's plan to develop a zero-emission aircraft for service entry in 2035.