Air India flight 144 was slated to reach Ahmedabad at 9.20 pm on Thursday, but it arrived at 1.00 pm on Friday. The flight took 40 hrs to reach Ahmedabad from New Jersey in place of 24 hrs.
Fifty-seven passengers of a Jet Airways flight had a miraculous escape when the aircraft's nose-wheel suffered a breakdown after landing at Ahmedabad on Thursday night.
However, the incident resulted in a harrowing time for more than 200 passengers of an international flight of Air India.
The New Jersey-Frankfurt-Ahmedabad flight of Air India was slated to land at Ahmedabad at 9.20 pm on Thursday.
However, it could not do so as the Jet Airways aircraft had blocked the runway.
After hovering above Ahmedabad airport for some time, pilots of AI Flight 144 decided to return to Mumbai. This is where the ordeal of the 230 passengers aboard the flight began. The passengers were not allowed to de-board at Mumbai, and had to spend the whole night sitting in the plane.
According to passengers, they were allowed to alight from the aircraft only in the morning for having snacks in the airport lounge.
Vinoda Pandya, a passenger from US, said, "It was a very bad experience for us. We were not provided food or water or tea in the flight. After landing in Mumbai, we were not told when we would be leaving for Ahmedabad. We spent the night in the aircraft."
However, Air India officials said that passengers were not offloaded from the aircraft as they were expecting to leave for Ahmedabad a couple of hours after landing at Mumbai. But, the flight got delayed as they didn't get clearance from Ahmedabad ATC, they said.
Passengers claimed that they were not treated properly and there was no one they could complain to. While majority of the passengers were Gujaratis, a few foreigners were also aboard the delayed flight.
While the flyers were stuck in Mumbai, people who had come to pick them up at Ahmedabad airport, had to spend the night at the airport. People had come from as far as Vadodara, Rajpipla and Anand to pick up their relatives and family members.
"We could not go back, as we were told that the flight could take-off any time from Mumbai once the runway in Ahmedabad was cleared. We spent the whole night at the airport. The flight arrived at 1.00 pm, 16 hours behind schedule," said Anand Mehta, whose relatives were on the flight.
Heated exchanges took place between passengers' relatives and CISF personnel at the airport over lack of clarity about the revised schedule of the delayed flight.
The Air India flight finally took off from Mumbai at around 11.00 am and landed at Ahmedabad at 1.00 pm. Emotional scenes were witnessed outside the arrival lounge at the airport as passengers came out of the building one after the other, and met with their family members and relatives.
Navin Lavani, a passenger from Frankfurt, said, "The flight was very tiring. What was worse is that there was no official communication about when we would reach the destination. The women and children were worst affected by the long delay. Steps must be taken to avoid such situations."
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