Flight delays at Mumbai airport likely

Fliers using the Mumbai airport are in for delays, with one of the runways at the Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport (CSIA) remaining closed for eight months starting November.

“The reconstruction work at one of the runways will commence from November 1, and end on June 1, 2011, during which the primary runway will remain closed for operations from 9 am to 5 pm from Monday to Saturday,” said a release from Mumbai International Airport Ltd, the GVK-led consortium which operates the Mumbai airport.

“The secondary runway, however, will continue flight operations,” added the release. This upgrade work is part of the overall modernisation process of CSIA and will make the runway compatible for operating Airbus 380s.

 

The Mumbai airport has two runways crossing each other at an intersection, unlike Delhi, which has three runways — two of which are parallel to each other.

Mumbai airport is expected to exhaust its annual capacity of 40 million passengers of by 2013. A new airport, which will add 60 million a year, has been delayed by two years.