Jagran correspondent, New Delhi. Dense fog amid severe cold in North India has severely disrupted air operations at Delhi's Indira Gandhi International Airport (IGI).
Visibility level dropped to less than 50 meters on Wednesday morning. Due to this low visibility, 7 flights had to be canceled, while more than 100 international and domestic flights were delayed by hours.
Pilots faced huge difficulties in take-off and landing due to low visibility on the runway on Wednesday morning. According to the Indian Meteorological Department, moderate to dense fog was recorded in Palam and Safdarjung areas in the morning.
Due to the minimum temperature being around 9 degrees, the fog cover became deeper, due to which normal operations were not possible. Although the state-of-the-art CAT-III instrument landing system remained operational at the airport, the timing of many flights had to be changed in view of safety standards.
Due to flight delays, a huge crowd of passengers gathered at the airport terminal. During this period, the delayed planes flew towards their destination with a delay of half an hour to 4 hours. Considering the seriousness of the situation, aviation regulator DGCA has instructed all airlines to remain alert and provide timely information to passengers.