Rainwater seepage into generator caused Kolkata airport black-out

Kolkata: Seepage of rainwater into the emergency back-up generator at the international airport here caused the 10-minute blackout in a runway, affecting flight operations on Monday night, airport officials said here today.
"Preliminary investigations suggest that as the power supply went off, the emergency back-up generator failed to function due to seepage of rainwater, causing a mechanical fault," an airport official told reporters today. There was total black-out in the runway and the taxiway for 10 minutes, forcing the Air Traffic Control (ATC) to ask two planes to hover in the air and delay take-off by a flight of Air-India and another of Singapore Airlines. Describing the incident as unprecedented in recent times, the official said rainwater accumulation had been caused problems in the airport area.
25/08/10 Economic Times

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Categories: airports aug 2010, Safety Aug 2010