'No flights took off for 5 hrs': EazyDiner founder blasts DGCA for closing Delhi airport's main runway during fog season

Dining app EazyDiner founder Kapil Chopra on Sunday slammed aviation regulator DGCA and the Civil Aviation Ministry for having only one operational runway at the Delhi Airport. He said the airport had four runways, but only one was operational. "The operational runway does not have CAT 3, so cannot operate in fog. No flights took off for 5 hours," he said in a series of tweets. 

CAT III refers to an Instrument Landing System (ILS), which allows flights to land in adverse weather conditions like dense fog or rain. In the last few days, severe dense fog has engulfed Delhi, causing zero visibility. This, in turn, has badly affected the landing and takeoff of flights at the Delhi Airport. 

Chopra said people were in this takeoff queue on Sunday morning for hours. "So the flights with passengers are waiting to take off. Then as AC and engines are on, it needs fuel again, so it goes for refuelling out of the queue. But how does it matter to our authorities," he said.

The entrepreneur claimed that the main runway with CAT 3, which allows landing in close to zero visibility, has been under maintenance since December 15, the time when fog conditions started to worsen in north India. "When is fog season in Delhi? December end to January. But the sleeping mandarins in @DGCAIndia and @Officejmscindia don’t know this!"

With basic common sense and planning, he continued, this could have been done better. "Harms our image as a country and what about people who were going for an emergency? Someone needs to haul these guys up for wasting public time, pollution and inconvenience. Chaos due to a sleeping ministry."

Chopra said that he landed back in Delhi on Saturday, so escaped all this mess, "but know of so many people who were stuck in the aircraft for close to 3 hours on the runway". "We can do all this PR about Delhi airport only airport in India to have 4 runways and operate only 1."

Hours after Chopra's post, a social media user in a tweet at 10:39 pm said three runways were active right now. "However, you'd be right about morning time with low visibility.. only one CATIIIB runway was available."

A total of 10 flights were diverted, nearly 100 delayed and some cancelled at the Delhi airport on Sunday morning as low visibility conditions due to dense fog disrupted operations, according to news agency PTI.

A total of 10 flights, including 2 international flights, were diverted to Jaipur between 4.30 am and 12 noon. Nearly 100 flights, including overseas services, were delayed and some of the flights cancelled due to the bad weather, the official told the news agency.