Dense fog disturbs flight services at Chennai airport

Over 60 services were affected in last three days

Dense fog has disturbed flight services at the Chennai airport as visibility level dropped to 50-100 meters in the last three days.

Over 60 aircraft took off very late or had been diverted to airports in Hyderabad and Bengaluru.

According to airport sources, in the last three days, 62 services in both passenger and cargo had been affected due to “smog”.

This has not only created inconvenience to the passengers, but also resulted in “substantial”cost to the airline operators, said industry sources.

Flight delays ranged from 3-4 hours for domestic passengers and in one or two international routes, the delay has even been 12 hours. Around 240-260 flights got delayed for 15-20 minutes, said the official.

A senior official representing a private airline said the current scenario was something “unusual” for Chennai and the airlines were facing cost pressures and troubles in realigning the schedules.

Fog is rare in Chennai during January, but reports stated that condensation of water due to a combination of winds and high moisture levels affected the visibility.

Flights from the airport started to departure when visibility levels improved to more than 500 metres.

Experts noted the Chennai airport did not have the CAT IIIB instrument landing system (ILS) present in Delhi. The facility guides flights when the runway visibility falls below 500 meters.

Airline operators said diversion of schedules involves increased costs. “It’s a major chaos apart from additional cost.” Airlines have not been able to use the Bengaluru airport as it was also facing visibility issues.

Some of the flights which were diverted include IndiGo Airlines (from Singapore, Kolkata and New Delhi) , GoAir (from Mumbai), Air India (from Thiruvananthapuram and Dubai) and Jet Airways (from Mumbai). Several flights arrived after a delay of two-three hours after airlines rescheduled them at their airport of origin due to poor visibility in Chennai.

Flights to various destinations, including Delhi, Mumbai, Hyderabad, Bengaluru, Visakhapatnam and Kolkata, which were scheduled to depart between 5.45 am and 9 am, left from Chennai after a 3-hour delay.