Delhi airport authorities in a tizzy

Cargo plane tyre bursts; Jet flight in emergency landing

NEW DELHI: It’s been two days of disasters at the airports in the Capital. While an Italian cargo airline aircraft got stuck on a taxiing track after its tyre burst forcing the airport authorities to stop the two-runway operation at Indira Gandhi International airport on Tuesday, a Jet Airways flight made an emergency landing on Wednesday.

In the first incident, airport sources told DNA that the aircraft had touched down on the main runway 28 and was heading for its slotted parking bay when one of its tyres burst. The tyre-burst took place at 11.30 am throwing schedules of several domestic airlines completely out of gear.

“The aircraft had got stuck in such a way that its tail was precariously blocking the movement of big aircraft on the taxiing track and this hampered air traffic,” said a senior airport official.

As soon as the aircraft got stuck, the airport stopped the two-runaway operations for landing and departure of the aircraft. Switching over to single runway operations drastically slowed down flight clearance at the airport.

In the second mishap, a Delhi-Varanasi Jet Airways flight with 127 passengers on board made an emergency landing on Wednesday. The aircraft touched down on the main runway at 5.20pm and all the passengers were safely deplaned.