Flight operations were affected at Mumbai’s Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport for hours on Sunday because of a pothole on the main runway, PTI reported. The pothole developed as a result of the heavy rain in the city for most of the weekend.
“The secondary runway was in use while repairs were being carried out on the main runway, beginning at 6.30 am and ending at 10.30 am,” an unidentified official of the Air Traffic Control said, according to The Hindu.
As repairs were on, flights were delayed for 30 minutes to one hour at the Mumbai airport. As many as 122 arrivals and 242 departures were delayed on Sunday in Mumbai, and six flights were cancelled, according to flightradar24.com.
Mumbai’s civic body is often criticised for the city’s potholed roads, which worsen during the monsoon.
“A runway cannot be like a municipal road,” an airline commander was quoted as saying by The Times of India. “There should be no foreign objects like debris on the runway. A pothole has loose particles which could be sucked into the engine of a departing aircraft.”
This was the second time in less than a month that the main runway at the Mumbai airport was rendered non-functional. The main runway was closed for operations for more than 25 hours after a SpiceJet aircraft overshot the runway amid heavy rain and got stuck in the mud.
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