Visakhapatnam: Night flights to come to a halt for a few months

Visakhapatnam: Night flights are going to be disrupted for the next four months as Visakhapatnam Airport is all set to commence runway resurfacing work from November 16.

The exercise is expected to continue till April next and the flight services will be suspended during nights from 9 pm to 8 am.

With this, night flights operating via Visakhapatnam Airport are going to come to a grinding halt.

Based on resurfacing requirements, flight services that land and take off during nights at Visakhapatnam have already been rescheduled.

At present, Visakhapatnam Airport operates a total of 25 to 30 flights on a daily basis. The airport registers 8,000 to 8,500 footfalls a day. However, unable to match the required time slots, three flight services have been called off. They include flight services to Delhi, Hyderabad and Bengaluru.

Meanwhile, keeping the peak season in view, public representatives, airport authority officials, tour operators, Andhra Pradesh Air Travellers Association made repeated representations to the concerned ministries and officials to reconsider the timings suspended in the night for the scheduled resurfacing exercise. BJP state president D Purandeswari, MPs G V L Narasimha Rao and MVV Satyanarayana, among others, made representations towards this direction. However, their requests were not being considered.

Agreeing to the fact that the flight services in the night are going to be affected due to runway resurfacing, Visakhapatnam Airport Director S Raja Reddy says, “However, there is a scope for increasing flight services during the rest of the time. The resurfacing work has taken up to ensure safety of flights and security of passengers. The existing time will be utilised judiciously. The available time slots have been informed to respective airline operators.”

Currently, an international flight service to Singapore is being operated from Visakhapatnam at 11 pm. It is scheduled to depart an hour later. This service is likely to be rescheduled to 7 pm.

Last time, the runway resurfacing work was taken up at the airport a decade ago. It is a regular exercise followed at the airports.