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Normal air traffic resumes over Indian subcontinent as Pak airspace opens for all flights

Pakistan fully closed its airspace on February 26 after the IAF struck a JeM terrorist training camp in Balakot in retaliation for the Pulwama attack on February 14.

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Air India suffered a financial loss of over Rs 491 crore till July 2 as it had to re-route its various international flights (Photo: Reuters)
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More than four-and-half months after Pakistan closed its airspace for flights to and from India, Islamabad on Tuesday morning announced the opening of its airspace for all civilian flights.

Pakistan had shut down its airspace for Indian flights following the strikes by the Indian Air Force targeting a terrorist camp in Pakistan. With Islamabad opening its airspace for all civilian flights, Normal air traffic operations between India and Pakistan resumed on Tuesday.

Pakistan Civil Aviation Authority issued a NOTAM or A notice to airmen saying "with immediate effect Pakistan airspace is open for all type of civil traffic on published ATS (air traffic service) routes".

New Delhi, which had closed airspace to Pakistani planes also revised NOTAM immediately opening its space restoring normal air traffic over the Indian subcontinent. 

Pakistan had closed its airspace in February after it launched an attack on Indian military installations in response to Indian strikes on Jaish-e-Mohammad terror camps in Balakot on February 26. 

The United Nations-listed terror group was responsible for the February 14 Pulwama terror attack that killed more than 40 Indian security personnel.

After the Indian counterterror strikes, Pakistan had launched an attack on Indian military installations on February 27 following which New Delhi closed its airspace around the Pakistani border for a few days but closure for Pakistani planes remained until today.

The closure of Pakistani airspace had majorly impacted global air traffic especially for the flights operating to and from Afghanistan.

The Afghan aviation authority said that closure of Pakistani airspace had led to a loss of $27 million to Kabul in addition to disruption of passenger flights and India-Afghanistan air corridor. 

Closure of Pakistan airspace had also caused a loss of $100 million to Pakistan. Various Pakistani civil aviation authorities are losing overflight charges, parking and landing charges etc to the tune of $600,000. 

In fact number of direct flights to Pakistan have also been cancelled and its state-run national airlines PIA-Pakistan International Airlines, which is already under tremendous pressure, is facing more loss of revenue due to the closure of Airspace. 

A number of flights were also cancelled to India but since major Indian airspace was opened, New Delhi was able to absorb any losses.

Welcoming the opening of the air traffic, Air India said operation costs for one-way US and Europe-bound flights are likely to come down by Rs 20 lakh and Rs 5 lakh, respectively.

"Ever since Pakistani airspace was closed, we had to reroute our flights south of Pakistan. Flying time for long haul flights towards USA increased by 90 minutes, fuel usage also increased. As Pakistan airspace is open now, aircraft utilization will go up while crew requirement will come down by 25%. From tonight, flight operation may commence on the original schedule, as earlier," an Air India spokesperson said. 

With the opening of Pakistani airspace, in the past several hours, 533 aircrafts have transited/done overflights over Pak Airspace which includes 51 Aircrafts that flew from India over Pakistani airspace.

Meanwhile, 43 pakistani aircrafts have used Indian Airspace since Tuesday morning's decision by both Pakistani and Indian governments. 

Air India suffered a financial loss of over Rs 491 crore till July 2 as it had to re-route its various international flights, Civil Aviation Minister Hardeep Singh Puri earlier told Rajya Sabha. Private airlines SpiceJet, IndiGo and GoAir lost Rs 30.73 crore, Rs 25.10 crore and Rs 2.10 crore respectively, data presented by Puri stated.

IndiGo also welcomed the development. 

"We are pleased with the latest development relating to the opening of the Pakistan airspace as announced today. IndiGo flights flying via Pakistan will operate as normal after all regulatory clearances by the concerned authorities," he said. 

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