Bad weather forces three flights to abort landing

Mumbai: Several air passengers were inconvenienced on Monday as three city-bound flights had to abort landing at the last minute and go-around mid-air due to the bad weather conditions in Mumbai. Early morning visibility on the airfield dropped to 900 metres, which is way below the permissible limit of 2,400 metres.
With one end of the main runway shut for repairs, flights were using part of the main runway and the secondary runway, which is not equipped with the Instrument Landing System (ILS).
At 8:27am, Jet Airways flight 9W 478 from Bangalore was the first to abort touchdown. The Boeing 737 aircraft circled above the airport for 20 minutes, but was made to do another go-around at 8:50am, as visibility did not improve. Air traffic controllers (ATC) finally diverted the flight to Baroda.
Subsequently, an Indigo Airlines flight from Kolkata was on final approach when the pilot realised that he could not see the runway. The Airbus A320 aircraft, however, did land in the city later.
An Air India flight from Bangalore also had to cancel landing at the last minute at 10.43am after its pilot spotted a Hyderabad-based Jetlite flight occupying the main runway.
12/10/10 Soubhik Mitra/Hindustan Times

To Read the News in full at Source, Click the Headline

Categories: airports Oct 2010