The Hindu : New Delhi News : Air, rail and road traffic hit hard by fog

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Tuesday, Dec 30, 2008
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New Delhi

Air, rail and road traffic hit hard by fog

Staff Reporter

PHOTO: V. V. KRISHNAN

FOGGY DAZE: Passengers wait at New Delhi railway station on Monday morning for trains running late because of thick fog in and around the Capital.

NEW DELHI: The new week began on a harrowing note for many in the Capital who found themselves caught in dense fog that enveloped Delhi on Monday, throwing air, rail and road traffic out of gear.

Flight operations at Indira Gandhi International Airport came to a near standstill early in the morning with over 35 flights delayed, 19 cancelled and eight diverted. The diverted flights included eight on international routes. While five of them were diverted to Mumbai, the rest were diverted to Jaipur, Lucknow and Ahmedabad.

According to airport officials, heavy fog enveloped the airport around 4 a.m. forcing the authorities to divert two international flights – a Royal Jordanian Airline flight from Amman and Jet Airways’ Dubai-Delhi -- to Mumbai. International flights from Kathmandu, Abu Dhabi and other cities were also affected. Some flights, mostly foreign-bound, operated with the help of CAT-III B operation systems.

Poor visibility forced the airport authorities to initiate low-visibility procedures between 1-10 a.m. and 12-45 p.m. According to Delhi International Airport Limited, a total of 62 flights operated thus, inclusive of arrivals and departures of 35 domestic and 27 international flights.

Most early morning flights to Mumbai, Chennai, Bhubaneswar, Bhopal and Coimbatore were delayed by up to four hours. Several people waiting to receive their relatives at Delhi airport were left stranded for hours with no information forthcoming on the actual time of arrival of the delayed flights.

Management executive Rajeev Bajaj said: “My relatives were to arrive in Delhi via Indian Airlines flight IC 440 from Chennai at 9-10 a.m. but it finally arrived only at 11-40. The worst part was that no one from the airport or the airline had any idea about the expected time of arrival after the delay and kept reassuring us that the flight was on time even though I asked them after the scheduled time of arrival had passed.”

Train services and road traffic in the Capital were also badly affected due to the heavy blanket of fog.

According to Northern Railway, six trains from Delhi were cancelled and nine rescheduled. Nearly 30 trains headed for the city were running late.

Several trains, including Rajdhanis, to and from Delhi were running several hours behind schedule.

The Rajdhanis running late included the Mumbai-Delhi, Howrah-New Delhi, Rajendra Nagar (Patna)-New Delhi and Bhubaneswar-New Delhi.

“The delays are due to heavy fog in Delhi and other parts of North India. The trains are currently stranded at railways stations near Delhi,” said a Northern Railway spokesperson.

Long-distance trains running late due to the fog were the Gaya-New Delhi Mahabodi Express, Chennai Central-New Delhi Grand Trunk Express, Allahabad-New Delhi Prayagraj Express, Howrah-New Delhi Poorva Express and Udhampur-New Delhi Uttar Sampark Kranti Express. They were running four to five hours behind schedule.

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