On Wednesday, Surat airport remained operational for an extra one hour waiting for the landing of an Air India Express flight that took off more than an hour late from the national capital.
An Air India aircraft with 242 passengers on board heading to London crashed in the Meghaninagar area near Ahmedabad airport on Thursday afternoon, the police said.
The aircraft, which departed from New Delhi, was in Pakistani airspace when a male passenger fell seriously ill, according to sources from the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA).
More than 300 flights have been cancelled and at least 25 airports, including Srinagar, have been temporarily shut for operations amid restrictions in the wake of the armed forces launching missile attacks on terror targets in Pakistan on Wednesday morning.
Army spokesman Lt Gen Ahmad Sharif Chaudhry in a media interaction said at least 26 people were killed and 46 injured in the missile strikes on cities in Punjab and PoK. "The six locations that India attacked last night... Pakistan lost 26 people and 46 were injured," he said.
Following the mid-air collision between an American Airlines plane and a United States Army helicopter in which all 67 are feared dead, President Donald Trump on Thursday blamed former Democratic Presidents Joe Biden and Barack Obama for lowering air safety standards.
Domestic air traffic clocked slowest growth in 4 years on high fares and flight cancellations.
Meanwhile, a precautionary blackout has been enforfced in the multiple areas amid the esclating tensions between India and Pakistan.
Colonel Sofiya Qureshi revealed that 300 to 400 drones were deployed across 36 locations, with several being shot down by Indian forces using both kinetic and non-kinetic methods.
Trump said his administration also dismissed Biden-era lawsuits against police and fire departments that were portrayed as racist for using writing tests, physical exams, and credit checks in their hiring processes.
The Prayagraj airport in India is experiencing a surge in air traffic due to the Maha Kumbh, a major religious festival. The airport is handling an average of 40 non-scheduled charters and private jets daily, with figures reaching 70 on weekends. This is in addition to the average 148 scheduled commercial passenger aircraft operating daily. The airport recently received a contingent of about 180 politicians from Rajasthan and has seen corporate bigwigs like the Ambani brothers, Gautam Adani, and Pawan Munjal pass through. The airport has also hosted four international flights since the beginning of the Maha Kumbh, including a flight carrying Laurene Powell Jobs, the wife of Apple co-founder Steve Jobs. The airport is currently undergoing an upgrade and expansion, and officials are looking forward to the government's plans to integrate Prayagraj with the airports at Kashi and Ayodhya to promote tourism in the region.
A strong dust storm and gusty winds followed by rain hit Delhi-NCR on Friday evening, causing trees to be uprooted in several parts and leading to traffic congestion. Thunderstorms caused power disruptions in several parts of the city, primarily due to trees and branches falling on electricity cables. The India Meteorological Department (IMD) has issued an orange alert, recommending people stay indoors and avoid unnecessary travel.
Airlines flew 2.1 mn passengers in July, against 1.9 mn in June.
Pakistan military spokesperson Lieutenant General Ahmad Sharif Chaudhry told a hurriedly called press conference in Islamabad at around 4 am that th Pakistan air force's Nur Khan (Chaklala, Rawalpindi), Murid (Chakwal) and Rafiqui (Shorkot in Jhang district) airbases were targeted.
The scenes that unfolded after the deadly mid-air collision between American Eagle flight 5342 and a US army Black Hawk helicopter while approaching the Reagan Washington national airport and crashed into the Potomac river in Arlington, Virginia, outside Washington, DC, January 29, 2025.
High frequency indicators, like vehicles sales, air traffic, steel consumption and GST E-way bills, point towards a sequential pickup in momentum of economic activity during the second half of the fiscal 2024-25 and sustain moving forward, RBI Bulletin said on Wednesday. However, a strong dollar, driven by US economic resilience and trade policy pivots, could exacerbate capital outflows from emerging economies, push risk premiums higher, and intensify external vulnerabilities, said an article on 'State of the Economy' published in RBI's February bulletin.
The total domestic passengers carried by all scheduled airlines last month was 36.3 lakh (3.63 million) compared with 35.97 lakh (3.59 million) in July, the statistics showed. In July, this figure was lower by about a lakh compared with that in June, indicating stability in the passenger traffic growth rate.
The 270-km Jammu-Srinagar highway reopened on Sunday after a day-long closure due to heavy snowfall, allowing stranded vehicles to proceed to their destinations. However, several other important inter-district routes, including the Mughal Road, Sinthan Pass, Sonamarg-Kargil inter-UT road, and Bhaderwah-Chamba inter-state road, remained closed for vehicular traffic due to heavy snowfall.
To tap Indian civil aviation market's growth potential, the government on Saturday announced a modified regional air connectivity scheme UDAN (Ude Desh ka Aam Naagrik) to connect 120 new destinations, airport projects in Bihar and upgradation of infrastructure for air cargo in the Union Budget.
The trails of mega-mergers, tailwinds of expanding fleets, flights and airports will dot the fast-growing Indian aviation firmament in 2025, though the dark clouds of supply chain woes will persist longer. Also, new airline takeoffs, the future trajectory of revised norms to tackle pilot fatigue and efforts to reduce carbon emissions will be on the radar.
All in-coming and out-going flights operated on schedule from the airport even as employees struck work.
According to Icra, domestic passenger traffic declined by 1.1 per cent in March, overall traffic saw a de-growth of 0.1 per cent in the month as international aircraft movement dipped by 1 per cent while domestic aircraft movement was flat.
Constructed at a cost of about Rs 100 crore, the tower stands at a height of 83.3 metre.
The civil aviation ministry is planning to send air traffic controllers to Australia for training in simultaneous use of converging runways.
Airlines must ensure that all check-in counters at the Delhi airport are fully staffed to minimise passenger inconvenience as smog has started affecting the flight operations, Aviation Minister Rammohan Naidu directed on Wednesday. The minister gave this direction during a meeting with representatives of major airlines, Delhi International Airport Limited (DIAL), officials of the Ministry of Civil Aviation, Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) and the Bureau of Civil Aviation Security (BCAS).
The airport, being developed by the Adani Group, is expected to start commercial operations early next year.
With burgeoning air traffic, India could soon face a severe shortage of air traffic control officers (ATCOs), a top aviation official said today, asking the Airports Authority of India to take immediate steps torecruit them in large numbers.
'I eagerly await the day when we can experience a truly great Bollywood movie rooted in pure historical facts, one that authentically showcases the essence of our armed forces for Indian audiences,' notes Air Commodore Nitin Sathe (retd).
The domestic air travel in the first three months of this year witnessed a sharp fall with the number of passengers carried declining by almost 12 per cent over the same period last year.
Official sources said an ATC official had been suspended pending the DGCA probe, which would establish accountability and find out lapses in the system.
According to May results of the International Air Transport Association, Indian domestic traffic rose just 0.1 per cent year-over-year, but fell 2.7 per cent compared to April.
Last year, air traffic grew by 9.7%.
Earlier in the day, an IndiGo A320 passenger aircraft landed successfully at 1.32 pm at runway 08/26 of the under-construction Navi Mumbai International Airport, paving the way for the Navi Mumbai International Airport Ltd (NMIAL) to seek an aerodrome licence from the aviation safety regulator Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) to start commercial flight services.
All Indian carriers flew 60.22 lakh (6.02 million) passengers in May compared to 57.10 lakh (5.71 million) in April, while the January-May figure stood at 267.22 lakh (Rs 2.67 million) as against 260 lakh (2.6 million) in the same period last year recording a 2.78 per cent growth, latest official air traffic data showed.
The DGCA has derostered the Air Traffic Controller (ATC) who was on duty at the time of the incident on Saturday, while IndiGo has initiated a probe into the matter
Pakistan airline authorities fear that the terrorist attacks on Karachi airport terminal building could negatively impact the flow of international air traffic at the Jinnah international airport in Karachi.
Normal life was thrown out of gear in Kashmir on Saturday as most areas of the valley received snowfall, disrupting flight and railway operations and also leading to the closure of the Srinagar-Jammu National Highway, officials said.
AAI would like the company to operate as a subsidiary in order to make sure that the revenue does not go out of its kitty.
Driven by a boom in domestic tourism, a record number of weddings in November and December, and a surge in extended weekend vacations.
The overall domestic air travel markets expanded four per cent in 2012 compared to 2011.
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