To minimise inconvenience to passengers in the winter months due to flights getting affected by adverse weather conditions, the Delhi airport has taken a number of steps, including increasing the equipment for allowing flights to operate even when visibility at the airport drops to 400 meters and increasing the number of parking slots for aircraft.

For the first time, runway 09/27 is equipped with three devices to measure the runway visual range (RVR), which allows flight departures even when visibility at the airport is just up to 400 meters, the airport operator said in a statement.

Pilots depend on RVR readings during adverse weather conditions to take a decision on whether they should operate a flight or not.

In conjunction with Air Traffic Controller, the airport operator has also introduced a Pre-Departure Sequencing tool as part of Delhi Airport-Collaborative Decision Making (DA-CDM).

“This will enable us to recover much faster at the time of flight disruptions during low visibility conditions. DA-CDM plays a pivotal role in enhancing our overall operational efficiency. It also helped us in achieving an overall on-time performance of 90 per cent in September this year which is comparable to top airports worldwide”  I Prabhakara Rao, airport’s Chief Operating Officer, said.

Besides, runways 28, 29 and 11 at the Delhi airport are certified for CAT III B operations, which will allow landing of compliant aircrafts with visibility as low as 50 meters. 

DIAL project

The airport is run by Delhi International Airport (P) Ltd (DIAL) a joint venture company comprising the GMR Group, Airports Authority of India and Fraport. The project being developed by DIAL under the public private partnership mode has been given the mandate to finance, design, build, operate and maintain the Delhi Airport for 30 years with an option to extend it by another 30 years.

comment COMMENT NOW