Saturday, March 12, 2016

Ignorant Air India flier boards conveyor belt to catch flight

New Delhi: It's a curious case of an Air India flier which could have turned fatal. Early Friday morning, a man kept on moving for almost 150-200 metres on the conveyor belt and cleared level-1, where he even passed through the X-ray machine, used for baggage scanning. Finally, an employee noticed him and stopped the conveyor belt.
The irony is that Delhi airport, recently awarded as world's number one airport, witnessed one of the most bizarre incidents clearly because of negligence by the national carrier, Air India, and the airport operator.
The trauma didn't end here. When the matter was brought to the notice of the terminal manager, he asked the employee to bring back the passenger through the same belt by moving it in reverse direction for about 200 metres. According to a senior airport official, the decision taken by terminal manager could have resulted in serious mishap.
The man was later taken to the police station. Surprisingly, the DIAL has installed CCTV camera and staff have been deployed to check Baggage Handling System (BHS) but no one noticed that a man was sitting on baggage belt along with his luggage. However, sources said the man was travelling for the first time and he got confused when he was directed by the airport employee to move towards the check-in counter.
Sources said the man, identified as Rajkumar Yadav, was stopped just before entering level-2 of the baggage handling system where the luggages are sorted automatically. The system, sources said, could have endangered his life.
"Around 1am on Friday, Rajkumar Yadav, who was set to travel to Riyadh by Air India flight AI 925, was noticed at level-1, conveyor belt no. 07. An employee responsible for conveyor belts and in-line baggage system noticed him after he managed to cross the X-ray machine. No staff of other check-in counter as well as DIAL noticed him. Later, he was handed over to the police with the help of CISF, guarding the IGI Airport," a senior airport official told Mail Today. He was later accommodated in the next flight to fly to Riyadh.
According to sources, Yadav was a first-time air traveler and he got confused when an airport staff directed him towards check-in counter.
12/03/16 Ankur Sharma/India Today