Trouble is going to increase soon for people catching flights from Indira Gandhi International Airport (IGI). GMR, the company that operates Delhi Airport, has announced that IGI’s runway 10/28 will remain closed for three months. Due to this decision, no aircraft will be operated from runway 10/28 from 15 June to 15 September.
The runway will be upgraded
Videh Kumar Jaipuriar, CEO of Delhi International Airport Limited, said, “Runway 10/28 of Delhi’s IGI Airport is being closed for 90 days. CAT III B equipment and ILS system have to be installed in these 90 days.”
Jaipuriar further said, “Apart from changing the ILS equipment, we are also making a part of the runway, which was not CAT III compliant, we will make it CAT III compliant, which will be beneficial in flight operations during the fog season. He said that during operations in the eastern direction during the fog season, our recovery rate was very high, and there was also a lot of delay. In such a situation, to avoid such inconvenience to the passengers in the future and to not affect flight operations, it has been decided to close the runway for 3 months.”
Flight operations will be affected
Delhi International Airport has a total of four runways, out of which flight operations will continue as before except for one, 10/28. However, the closure of even one runway will affect many flights. Jaipuriar said that during the three-month runway closure, the arrival capacity will temporarily decrease from 42 flights per hour to 32, which will affect major areas like Mumbai and Patna. According to information, 1450 aircraft operate from Delhi Airport every day.
More than 100 flights will be affected daily
Jaipuriar said that more than 100 flights will be affected due to the runway closure. About 114 flights will be cancelled every day, including both incoming and outgoing flights. While 43 flights will be rescheduled. According to Videh Kumar Jaipuriar, only 7-8% of the daily incoming passengers will be affected. However, passengers have already been informed about the inconvenience caused to them and the changes in flight operations.
Passengers’ convenience was taken care of
The CEO of Delhi International Airport Limited said that this time has been chosen so that passengers do not face any inconvenience. Because this is not the peak time. Secondly, all the preparations have been completed in advance so that passengers do not face any problem in travelling this time. He said that the current decision has been taken after several rounds of discussions with airlines, DGCA, ATC and Civil Aviation Ministry.
Flight operations will be facilitated during fog
Runway 10/28, one of the four runways of Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International Airport (IGIA), is to be upgraded to CAT 3B-compliant status, along with its Instrument Landing System (ILS). After the upgradation works, the runway will be fully ready to handle low visibility operations (LVO) from both its ends instead of just one end at present. After the upgrade, the airport will have three runways capable of low visibility operations, which will enable it to better manage operations during winter fog. In fact, being in North India, Delhi airport is engulfed in dense fog during winters. In such a situation, there is a problem in aircraft operations at the country’s largest airport.
Jaipuriar said that CAT-3B compliance for runway 10 will be completed by November 27. The biggest benefit of this will be that the time taken to deal with fog during easterly winds will be reduced from six hours to three hours.
It is worth noting that the work of upgrading the runway was started in April, but during that time a large number of aircraft were affected. In such a situation, the Ministry of Civil Aviation intervened in the matter and directed to proceed with the work, after which the work was stopped and now the upgradation work will be started again from June 15.
