The Hindu : New Delhi News : Fog returns to disrupt flights

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, Feb 18, 2006

New Delhi

New Delhi

Fog returns to disrupt flights

Staff Reporter

NEW DELHI: Flight operations were disrupted at Delhi airport due to heavy fog on Friday morning with no aircraft being able to take off till past 10 a.m. As a result, almost all the flights through the day were delayed while 15 were diverted to other cities when the fog was really dense.

With fog settling in at around 2-30 a.m., there were no operations till 9-30 a.m. causing a major backlog of flights and forcing passengers to wait for hours.

"The runaway visibility range (RVR) came down to 350 metres. While low visibility procedures were put into use, airlines that do not have trained pilots for these conditions were affected. The weather started improving around 9-30 a.m. and an hour later things almost became normal," an airport official said.

The international passengers also bore the wrath of nature as 12 flights coming into the city from various countries were diverted to Lucknow, Ahmedabad, Kolkata, Chennai and Karachi, thereby adding to the travel time of the passengers. Four domestic flights were also diverted to Jaipur and Lucknow.

While Indian -- the most `dependable' airline in the skies according to a survey by one of the pink newspapers -- did not have any cancellations, its flights were also delayed. The first Indian flight to take off was a flight to Ahmedabad at 9-20 a.m.

Private airlines were also affected with most of their flights running behind schedule due to the backlog. More than 10 Jet Airlines flights were delayed in the morning and one flight to Leh was cancelled.

The first Sahara Airlines flight to take off in the morning was at 10-40 a.m. While the airline clubbed more than three flights together to control the situation, most of its flights through the day ran an hour behind because of the pile-up caused by fog.

A repeat of the situation last Friday when unexpected fog played spoilsport with air traffic, the scene this Friday was worse with the effect of the fog stretching well into the day.

"There was so much of a backlog of flights from the morning that most flights through the day were delayed for three to four hours. Passengers had to wait for hours on board the aircraft itself in some cases," said a spokesman of a private airline.

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