Upgrade to CAT III or park at remote bays, DGCA tells airlines

New Delhi: Foggy Delhi winters have landed civil aviation authorities in a tug-of-war situation with private airlines. The airlines are complaining that they are being allocated remote parking bays at the airport just because they do not have CAT III compatible aircraft and crew, which is leading to delays.
The authorities, however, maintain that non-CAT III compliant airlines have to either upgrade or go to remote parking bays because the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) has issued directions to prioritise CAT III compliant airlines over the non-compliant ones.
As a result, the airlines are complaining of additional delays since buses ferrying passengers to these bays also have to slow down because of fog.
DGCA officials, however, say if the airlines want to avoid delay they have to either upgrade or just admit to their passengers that they are not CAT III compliant and start boarding 30 minutes earlier. The airlines, however, are not too keen on the upgradation as that will push up costs and the fog is just a fortnight long affair.
19/12/07 Anubhuti Vishnoi/Delhi Newsline

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Categories: Airports Dec 2007, General Aviation Dec 2007, Safety Dec 2007