No runway repair during peak hours at Mumbai

Mumbai: Bowing down to pressure from airlines and the air traffic controllers (ATCs), the Mumbai airport operator has stopped the two-hour runway repairs during the morning and evening peak hours. A Mumbai International Airport Limited (MIAL) spokesperson said, “It was a pro-active move to ease
congestion.” But, airport sources claim that airlines were not happy with the operator’s previous stand to open the full runway to only three foreign airlines.
The problem began on September 23, after MIAL shut a 340-metre stretch on one end of the main runway for widening work of an underground drain and expansion of taxiways. However, MIAL agreed to suspend the work during flight arrivals of Singapore Airlines, Saudi Airlines and Continental.
The airlines were given the privilege, as they do not use the secondary runway citing safety risks as a policy. Also, only the main runway is equipped with the Instrument Landing System (ILS), a ground-based instrument approach system, which guides an approaching aircraft using a combination of radio signals and, in many cases, high-intensity lighting arrays to enable a safe landing during reduced visibility.
05/10/10 Soubhik Mitra/Hindustan Times

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Categories: airports Oct 2010