The Hindu Business Line : Blues galore at Bengaluru International Airport

Bangalore/New Delhi, May 27 Aerobridges don’t connect, ladders can’t be pushed in time to the aircraft, baggage takes one to two hours to show up and flight schedules are going haywire. Welcome to the new Bengaluru International Airport.

The operator and hundreds of airport users are discovering the harsh ground realities. It has not been smooth sailing for BIA after it began operations on May 24. The operator, Bangalore International Airport Ltd, plays it down as the teething troubles of a new airport.

If the old HAL airport that closed down on May 24 was notorious for congestion in the air which added to the flying time, the newly opened airport 40 km away has been dogged by ground-handling hitches – which, too, are causing flight delays. Half-a-dozen low cost carrier and full-service airlines that Business Line spoke to admitted this on condition of anonymity. BIAL has picked Air India-SATS and GlobeGround as its ground handlers.

A common complaint is that flights are getting delayed by 45-60 minutes and refuelling is getting hit; most flights touch Bangalore and ground delays here cascade down to rest of the schedules.

The CEO of a low-cost carrier (LCC) confirmed, “We have taken some delays due to ground handling. This, however, is not unusual when a new airport opens.”

BIAL itself admitted that ground handling was a major problem. The situation was improving each day and, “We will iron out the teething problems within a week of operations”, it said.

Passengers complained of lack of co-ordination among services post or pre-flight; lack of information on flight arrivals and departures at the airport, apart from a long walk to the taxi/bus bays when they finally got out.

Take this elderly couple arriving from Nairobi via a GoAir flight from Mumbai on Tuesday. The flight landed on time at 10.10 a.m. but passengers had to wait for 30 minutes for the ladder. Those receiving them had no information on flight arrival. Baggage took them another half-an-hour. Once outside an hour later, they were clueless about the transport to city.

According to a BIAL spokesperson, even as early as in the first 18 hours, “The start-up team has reported that operations have been satisfactory in comparison with other such transitions around the world”. The personnel and the equipment were new and acclimatisation was taking time.

One LCC said one of its flights which arrived a few minutes late had its departure delayed by 35 minutes as ground-handlers could not get a wheel chair for a passenger. A Mumbai-based full-service carrier said the ground situation had not matured since Day 1, which itself was riddled with communication lapses.

Yet another LCC source blamed it on poor infrastructure for all airport services. Its view: “The onus lies largely with the operator, who controls 80 per cent of the critical functional aspects, who should give enough space for back-end operations. The planning has been beautiful but the integration has been nightmarish.”