Surat airport peak hour passenger handling capacity to triple Dec 2021: AAI

The peak hour passenger handling capacity at Surat airport, which is currently under expansion at an investment of Rs 353 crore, will be tripled to 1,800 passengers by December next year, the AAI said

The peak hour passenger handling capacity at Surat airport, which is currently under expansion at an investment of Rs 353 crore, will be tripled to 1,800 passengers by December next year, the Airports Authority of India (AAI) said on Thursday.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi had on January 30 last year laid the foundation stone for extension of terminal building at Surat airport.

The AAI-run airport in the diamond and textile city of Gujarat handled 1.51 million passengers in the fiscal year ended March 31, 2020, according to AAI's website.

The expansion work includes extension of existing terminal building from 8,474 sqm to 25,520 sqm, expansion of apron from five parking bays to 23 and construction of a parallel taxi track, AAI said in a release.

The airport witnessed around 600 per cent growth in traffic between 2016-17 to 2018-19, which is among the highest passenger traffic growth in the recent past, it added.

After completion of the ongoing expansion project in December 2021, the new state-of-the-art extended terminal building will be capable of handling 1,200 domestic and 600 international passengers during peak hours or 2.6 million passengers per annum, AAI said.

Surat airport's current peak hour passenger handling capacity stands at around 600 passengers, a senior airport official said.

Equipped with all modern passenger amenities, the terminal building will have 20 check-in counters, five aerobridges, in-line baggage handling system, five conveyor belts for arriving passengers and car parking for 475 cars, AAI said.