Special Correspondent :
Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport [HSIA] remained blanketed with thick fog on Thursday for over six hours causing delay of almost all inbound and outbound flights.
At least thirteen flights, including four international and nine domestic, were rescheduled due to poor runway visibility since 4:00am, Airport officials said.
Hundreds of local and international passengers of different airlines had to wait in the congested lounge for hours.
Of them, Biman Bangladesh Airlines, Regent, NovoAir, US Bangla and Gulf Air faced debacle to manage their passengers following reschedule of their flights. Some planes were seen roaming around the Airport getting no clearance from the control tower.
HSIA authorities said they had to change schedule of all domestic and international flights in all routes while most of the Dhaka bound planes landed at HSIA after 2/3 hours delay. On the other hand, the outgoing flights were around 3-5 hours late.
“A Dhaka-bound flight of the US-Bangla Airlines from Singapore was diverted to Chittagong. Besides, two other flights of Regent and Gulf Air also did not get permission for landing,” Inquiry Official Shahidul Haq said.
Sources in the HSIA said the situation became tensed when hundreds of passengers of different airlines refrained from boarding their planes due to rescheduled arrangement. Especially, the condition of children, women and elderly passengers was miserable.
The HSIA, however, returned to its normal flight operation activities after 10:05am when the fog started to disappear slowly. Public Relations Officer of Civil Aviation Authority, Bangladesh Rezaul Karim said, “After resuming operation, the first flight of US-Bangla Airlines left HSIA at 10:08am. Besides, another flight landed at 10:15.”
Meanwhile, the officials of the Department of Meteorology have cautioned that foggy atmosphere may prevail a few more days. In a bulletin issued yesterday the met office said, weather may remain dry with temporary partly cloudy sky over the country. Moderate to thick fog may occur over the country during mid night till morning and it may continue at places up to noon.
Flight disruption at HSIA is nothing new. Rather it becomes a common phenomenon in the recent days where the authorities seem helpless, while some facilities like fog lights on runway are not up to the mark.
It is alleged that existing infrastructure of HSIA will not be able to accommodate the growing traffic of the country after two to three years.
Not only that, the HSIA is not capable to handle new generation aircraft; such as Airbus 380, B747, B777-300 ER and others.
