The Airports Authority of India (AAI) has prepared a master plan to expand the Thoothukudi airport.
Addressing a meeting of the airport advisory committee here on Tuesday, E.C. Taji, Airport Director, said the master plan envisaged provision of several key facilities to upgrade Thoothukudi airport. Once 586 acres of land was acquired and handed over to the AAI, expansion and upgrading work would be taken up immediately and completed in two years. The State government had agreed to hand over 586 acres of land free of cost to the AAI. The AAI was ready to install Doppler VHF Omni Directional Range (DVOR) at the airport.
Referring to facilities envisaged in the master plan, she said the new runway would be 3000 metres long to facilitate landing of wide bodied aircraft. Other facilities would include new international and domestic terminal building with world class passenger facilities, new technical block and air traffic control tower, hangers for aircraft maintenance, state-of-art communication and navigational facilities, cargo complex for international and domestic cargo, instrument landing system for all-weather landing and advanced security equipment.
J. Jeyasingh Thiyagaraj Natterjee, Thoothukudi MP, and chairman, airport advisory committee, appealed to the AAI to revive the British period air base near Kayathar. He wanted the airport authorities to accord top priority to runway extension to accommodate bigger aircraft and also establish nigh navigational facilities.
T. Johnson, president, Indian Chamber of Commerce of Industry, highlighted the need for flight service to Colombo and said that it would generate more income for the AAI. . D.R. Kodeeswaran, secretary, ICCI, sought an elevated road corridor to connect Thoothukudi airport and seaport. A. Sankar, Director, Empower, NGO, said that with only two flight services in a day passengers were often stranded owing to recurring technical problems. R. Sundararaj, Ottapidaram MLA, B. Jayakumar, Assistant General Manager, Communications, Prabakaran, Assistant General Manager, Civil Engineering, and members of the committee were present.
