'There's too much coincidence in back-to-back failures of missions critical to national security.'
A significant number of flights were impacted at the Delhi and Mumbai airports in the last few days due to dense fog and low visibility conditions.
Owing the sudden rains, Mumbai's Chhatrapati Shivaji international airport too announced a temporary suspension of flights. While incoming flights have been diverted to other destinations like Goa and Ahmedabad, outgoing flights have been delayed. Airport sources said flights are being resumed in a staggered manner to cope with the rush and it will take some time for normalcy to return.
Many passengers rushed out of an IndiGo aircraft at the Mumbai airport, sat on the tarmac, and some were also seen having food there as soon as their diverted Goa-Delhi flight landed after a long delay on Sunday.
The Indian government defended its decision to revoke the security clearance of Turkey-based Celebi without warning, citing an "unprecedented" threat to aviation security. Solicitor General Tushar Mehta argued that giving a hearing or reasons before taking action would "defeat the purpose" in matters of national security. The decision came after Turkey backed Pakistan and condemned India's airstrikes on terror camps in the neighboring country. Celebi, which operates at nine Indian airports, has challenged the government's move in court.
On May 28, following the bomb threat, which later turned out to be hoax, all the passengers were evacuated through emergency slides from the aircraft at the Delhi airport.
Besides, as many as 44 per cent of the incoming flights were delayed by an average 8 minutes.
Facing disruptions due to non-availability of crew, Vistara on Sunday announced reducing 10 per cent of its capacity or 25-30 flights daily and most of the cancellations are in the domestic network as the Tata Group airline strives to stabilise operations. The full-service carrier is to operate over 300 flights daily in the ongoing summer schedule and witnessed significant disruptions earlier this week as many pilots reported sick, resulting in cancellations of flights. "We are carefully scaling back our operations by around 25-30 flights per day, i.e. roughly 10 per cent of the capacity we were operating.
A few weeks back, hundreds of flights had received bomb threat calls that later turned out to be hoaxes.
Reports said that hurricane Beryl, originating in the Atlantic, had intensified with maximum sustained winds of 210 kmph.
A Defence spokesperson said on Friday that the Defence Ministry had neither accorded nor denied landing permission for an aircraft carrying Congress leader Rahul Gandhi at the Naval airport in Kochi.
Aircraft supply to airlines will remain constrained during the next four to five years due to the supply chain issues being faced by plane makers Airbus and Boeing and there is not much that carriers can do beyond optimising their flight network expansion, Air India CEO and MD Campbell Wilson said on Tuesday.
The Bhopal MP was was asked to move to a non-emergency row seat as she was on a wheelchair but she refused, causing the flight to delay of almost 45 minutes. Ultimately, she acquiesced and moved.
A clinical India outclassed Sri Lanka by nine wickets in the rain-hit opening ODI of the women's tri-nation series in Colombo, on Sunday.
"The decision came after the cabin crew reported disruptive conduct on board, specifically a dispute between a husband and wife," sources told ANI.
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 incident took place on Thursday when the aircraft was taxing out for take off with 98 passengers on board and the flight was cancelled, it said.
Starting November 12, Vistara aircraft will be operated under the Air India banner, to be identified by a special four-digit flight code beginning with "2".
Domestic air traffic rose 4.8 per cent on an annual basis to 126.48 lakh in February, while more than 1.55 lakh passengers were affected by flight delays during the same period, according to official data released on Friday. In February, Air India's market share rose to 12.8 per cent from 12.2 per cent while that of IndiGo marginally dipped to 60.1 per cent from 60.2 per cent in January. The domestic air traffic climbed to 126.48 lakh in February compared to 120.69 lakh in the year-ago period, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) said.
Opposition members in Rajya Sabha on Thursday accused the government of imposing Hindi by bringing new bills with titles only in that language, a charge the treasury bench contested while alleging they were stuck with a colonial mindset.
The AI-111 flight departed from the Delhi airport at around 5.20 pm instead of its scheduled departure time of 2 pm, they said.
Congress Rajya Sabha MP Renuka Chowdhury did not turn up on time despite repeated announcements.
'Of course, it's wrong to hit the pilot 100 per cent, I will not agree with that. But why was he blaming passengers in this'
Akasa Air has asked the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) to exempt it from deploying CAT-III trained pilots on flights to and from two major fog-affected airports, Kolkata and Bengaluru, for specific periods, since there is a shortage of such pilots in its roster.
Following the incident, which took place at Chennai airport last week, the Airports Authority of India raised the issue with IndiGo, asking it not to pass the blame for flight delays "falsely" to the ATC, sources said.
The space agency is expected to launch the Rs 10,000-crore "Gaganyaan" in 2022, the year of the 75th anniversary of India's Independence.
'Our production capacity ramp-up initiatives are expected to meet the critical requirements of our armed forces.'
'Currently, it takes between two and three years to formulate the request for proposal for procuring specific military equipment for the armed forces. It should not be this way.'
About a dozen flights were on Wednesday delayed after a blanket of fog enveloped New Delhi, also marginally bringing down the mercury to below 13 degree Celsius.
A dozen flights were delayed by around 30 to 40 minutes here this morning as refuelling was affected by a strike called by the officers of the public sector oil companies that entered the second day on Thursday.
US President Donald Trump has imposed tariffs and a travel ban on Colombia after the South American nation refused to accept two American military planes deporting undocumented Colombians. The move comes after President Trump announced mass deportations of illegal immigrants and warned countries of consequences if they refuse to accept them. Colombian President Gustavo Petro, in a post on X, said that the US cannot treat Colombian migrants as criminals and denied the entry of American planes carrying Colombian migrants into Colombian territory. Trump responded by imposing a 25% tariff on all goods coming into the US, a travel ban and immediate visa revocations on Colombian government officials, and visa sanctions on all party members, family members and supporters of the Colombian government. The US also announced enhanced customs and border protection inspections of all Colombian nationals and cargo on national security grounds. In retaliation, Colombia announced a 25% import tariff on American products.
Karnataka Governor Thaawarchand Gehlot was on Thursday denied boarding on an Air India subsidiary AIX Connect flight over alleged 'delay' in reporting.
"The 'red bag' belonged to one of the hijackers, it contained explosives, and possibly, real passports, too.
"Fog become dense around 6 am and visibility dropped to below 100 metres on the new runway around 8 am, leading to delay in departure of around 15 flights," airport sources said.
Have you tried to change a flight recently? Or cancel a flight ticket? Or had to deal with indifferent -- even rude -- airline staff?
Passengers would be provided accurate information about flights through Flight Information Display System at the airport terminal.
Airfares have nearly doubled in a matter of days on routes hit by the cancellation of 200 weekly flights linking Mumbai airport to 12 cities. The fares have soared as high as 193 per cent following a recent government order to cancel flights to ease "persistent congestion" that was causing delays. Aside from the reduction in flights on 12 routes, two destinations - Hubli and Jabalpur - have lost connectivity with Mumbai since last week, according to aviation analytics firm Cirium's data reviewed
As photographs and video clips were distributed on social media, aviation security watchdog BCAS issued show cause notices to IndiGo and Mumbai airport operator MIAL over the incident, official sources said on Tuesday.
Wing Commander Raveendran and flight steward Sargeant Iyer, though shaken and injured, managed to open the rear door of the aircraft and shouted for Prime Minister Morarji Desai and the passengers in the forward cabin to exit in haste since they suspected that fire would engulf the aircraft.
Night temperature in Delhi went up to 14.4° C, the highest this winter, but morning fog blanketed the capital, reducing visibility to 600 mt, the Weather Office said Wednesday.
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