War rooms, more manpower: Aviation ministry's plan to deal with fog chaos

Civil Aviation Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia announced measures that will be taken to handle the fog-induced chaos at the Delhi airport and elsewhere, resulting in severe flight delays

Civil Aviation Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia, on Tuesday, issued further guidelines to deal with the ongoing airport chaos triggered by fog-induced flight delays in Delhi and elsewhere. Scindia said that six metro airports have been instructed to provide incidence reporting thrice every day. He also said that the strength of the armed forces will be increased at these airports for better management.

The development came a day after the aviation regulator DGCA issued a set of Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) on Monday to deal with the situation, which caused massive inconvenience to the passengers.

Scindia, highlighting his earlier post on social media platform X(formerly X), said "War Rooms' will be set up by airports…sufficient Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) manpower availability will be ensured round-the-clock…"
He further said that the RWY (runway) 29L at the Delhi airport or the Indira Gandhi International Airport (IGIA) has been made CAT III (Category III) operational from today and added that the airport's runway 10/28 will become operational after re-carpeting.

What is CAT-III instrument landing system

Notably, the Runway 28/10 was closed for renovation in September. It is Delhi Airport's second runway, which is equipped with the CAT-III Instrument Landing System (ILS). This key instrument helps the pilot during the aircraft's descent and landing operations when the visibility is as low as 50 metres. However, CAT III cannot handle zero visibility operations, Scindia had said on Monday.

The Delhi airport has four runways -- RW 09/27, RW 11R/29L, RW 10/28 and RW 11L/29R.

Low visibility condition to prevail in Delhi

Dozens of flights and train services remain impacted for hours due to low visibility in the national capital and adjoining north Indian states amid dense fog conditions.

Delhi's Palam weather station, located near the airport, had recorded zero visibility this morning at 7:30 am. The minimum temperatures in Delhi-NCR in the morning was recorded below 5 degrees Celsius in most areas. "Minimum temperatures realised during past 24 hours of 0830 hours of today are in the range of 2-5 degrees Celius over most parts of Punjab, Haryana-Chandigarh-Delhi; in the range of 6-10 degrees Celsius over many parts of Uttar Pradesh," the India Meteorological Department (IMD) said.

According to the IMD, dense fog conditions will prevail in parts of Punjab, Haryana, Chandigarh, and Delhi till the morning of January 18. It also warned that severe cold wave conditions will continue to impact these regions till January 20.

A dense fog range is defined when the visibility is up to 50 metres, according to the IMD.

(With inputs from agencies)