IGIA gets new eyes to peer through coming winter fog

The met department has got new Runway Visual Range machines for the runways

November 29, 2015 12:00 am | Updated 07:53 am IST - NEW DELHI:

A smog covered Rajpath on Saturday.—PHOTO: SHIV KUMAR PUSHPAKAR

A smog covered Rajpath on Saturday.—PHOTO: SHIV KUMAR PUSHPAKAR

Persistent thick smog is affecting visibility at the Delhi airport and dense fog might be just a fortnight away. This winter, however, flyers and airlines can look forward to some accurate fog forecast thanks to an infrastructure overhaul by the meteorological department.

Fog forecast is tricky business as the dynamics of fog sometime changes rapidly. One of the most crucial meteorological infrastructure that is required at an airport to get real time fog updates is a Runway Visual Range (RVR) machine and this year, the met department is replacing the old machines at the airport's runways with new ones and also adding more machines on standby. In simple terms, RVR is the distance at which a pilot can see the surface markings on a runway while landing.

Delhi's Indira Gandhi International Airport has earlier witnessed situations when malfunctioning RVR machines have eventually led to flight disruptions. With the airport now witnessing more than 1,000 flight movements a day, a technical glitch like this would result in utter chaos.

Taking no chances, the met department has installed eight RVR machines at the airport's third runway 29/11, even though the norm for fog landings require just three – one each at both ends and one in the middle. Dr. R.K. Jenamani, Director-in-Charge of the IGIA met unit said that while three new RVR machines have been installed as standby, two have been added at both ends specifically for Low Visibility Take Offs (LVTO).

“We are also dismantling the older RVR machines next to the older runway 28/10 and replacing them with new state-of-the-art RVR machines,” Dr. Jenamani said.

Thanks to the new infrastructure this winter, the met department hopes to come up with more accurate and real time fog data to help pilots.

Though the department is yet to make any official forecast about the onset of dense fog, Dr. Jenamani said that dense fog can be expected from mid-December.

“We are waiting for the present cloud spell to end by first week of December, after which the temperature is likely to fall and conditions for formation of dense fog will appear,” he said.

He said that apart from fog forecast, the met department will also carry out examination of fog in Delhi this winter. “We will examine the micro physics associated with fog formation such as droplet concentration, size and characteristic, apart from Ph and acidity levels in the droplets,” Dr. Jenamani said.

Though dense fog is yet to appear, a thick smog cover is already affecting visibility at the Delhi airport. From 11.30 a.m. on Friday to Saturday evening, visibility remained as low as 200 metres, with a rise to about 1100 metres during the day.

Dr. Jenamani said that instead of crop burning in Punjab, the smog engulfing Delhi at present is locally accumulated. “It is severe due to more moisture presently available by easterly winds and a relatively lower day and night temperature when compared with that of end of October,” he said. “This smog is also superimposed by some medium and high clouds in the skies and hence sun has not been visible. The smog, however, is likely to subside in the next two days as wind is likely to strengthen,” he said.

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