Passengers stranded for hours as fog delays 48 flights at KIA

Bengaluru: Hundreds of passengers set to leave the city ahead of Christmas were stranded for hours at Kempegowda International Airport (

KIA

) after operations were suspended from 6.30am to 7.30am due to

fog

and

low visibility

. While operations of 48 flights were disrupted, three were diverted, said sources.

Thirty-five flights scheduled for departure and 13 for arrival were delayed. A Bengaluru-bound Blue Dart flight from Mumbai, an Indigo flight (6E521) from Kochi and a Spicejet flight (SG 1035) from Hyderabad were diverted to the Chennai airport.

According to sources, the visibility standby declared by authorities at 5.31am was withdrawn over three hours later at 8.38am. Several passengers said flights were parked for hours on the airport tarmac.

“My Indigo flight to Chennai was supposed to take off at 9.30am. However, boarding was delayed by 20 minutes. After boarding, we were stuck in the aircraft for nearly one hour and 20 minutes. The flight finally took off at 11.20am, nearly two hours after the scheduled time of departure,” said Susan Jacob, a passenger and resident of CV Raman Nagar.

With several flights getting delayed, long queues were seen outside the information counters. Frustrated commuters, caught unawares by the suspension in operations, took to social media platforms to complain.

“Right now I’m stranded at Bangalore airport my flight is getting delayed continuously should have reached lucknow if it was in time (sic),” Gaurav Gupta posted on Twitter.

Manipal Global Education chairman TV Mohandas Pai tweeted: “Bangalore airport, overcrowded, AC poor, queues in toilet, working much beyond capacity, slow expansion only by 2020 @jayantsinha Minister pl visit to review, we suffer from overcrowding, a apathetic management, bad rude customer service @DrParameshwara (sic).”

Responding to Pai, Bengaluru International Airport Limited (BIAL) tweeted: “Dear Sir, noted and we are committed to working on the same. The increased load and traffic was due to the holiday season travel over the last 2-3 days and fog (sic).”

Third time in a month

Saturday’s disruption is the latest in a string of fog-related delays at KIA. On December 10, operations of 63 flights were disrupted. On November 27, operations were suspended for 14 minutes (6.32am to 6.48am) causing a delay in 39 flight departures.