The Hindu : Fog paralyses Capital

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, Jan 15, 2004

New Delhi

New Delhi

Fog paralyses Capital

By Our Staff Reporter

NEW DELHI, JAN. 14. Air and rail services in Delhi were paralysed for hours today as dense fog enveloped the capital in the morning hours. Vehicles on roads were also found moving at very slow pace and used headlights to avoid mishaps due to low visibility.

Dense fog also disrupted rail services leading to cancellation of at least eight trains and rescheduling of umpteen other incoming and outgoing trains, railway sources said.

Air passengers were once again put to great inconvenience today as dense fog led to cancellation, diversion and delay of a number of flights at the Indira Gandhi International Airport here.

The Airports Authority of India said the fog disrupted flight operations between 4 a.m. and 12 noon, leading to cancellation of 10 domestic flights, and diversion of eight international and domestic flights to other cities.

The AAI said it was around 4 a.m. that the runway visibility range (RVR) dipped to less than 75 metres at the airport bringing the flight operations to a complete halt. And it took over seven hours for the visibility to become sufficient for flights to operate.

In the intervening period, as many as 10 domestic flights were cancelled. The inability of the flights to land at the airport due to the RVR being less than 200 metres - which is the minimum needed for the CAT IIIA Instrument Landing System to be operationalised -- also resulted in five international flights being diverted to Mumbai. These included Air France 6738, Aeroflot 535, Air India 164, British Airways 143 and Alitalia 9049. Meanwhile, a Mahan Air 5071 flight was also diverted to Zahirain as landing was impossible with the visibility fluctuating between 125 metres and 150 metres for a good part of the morning.

It was only around noon that the visibility went over the 200 metre mark allowing for landing of flights using the CAT IIIA ILS. The first flight to land using the system was Lufthansa LH-8420 which was coming from France and landed at 11-47 a.m. in 250 RVR. Soonafter, an Emirates EK 512 flight from Dubai landed at 11-51 a.m. in 275 RVR and the first domestic departure of Indian Airlines (IC 817) for Ahmedabad took place at 11-55 a.m. in 275 RVR.

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