More than 550 flights were delayed at Delhi’s IGI Airport on Friday after heavy rain triggered an IMD red alert across the capital.
Palam saw the day’s heaviest rainfall at 75.6mm, with Naraina, Janakpuri, Lodhi Road and Safdarjung also recording substantial totals.
Ten aircraft had to be diverted during the disruption, with five sent to Jaipur, four to Lucknow, and one each to Ahmedabad and Chandigarh.
Flooding around Terminal 3 and the Vasant Kunj underpass disrupted road access to the airport, compounding delays for arriving and departing passengers.
Both IndiGo and Air India issued travel advisories, asking passengers to confirm flight status ahead of time and plan for slower road travel.
Five aircraft were redirected to Jaipur, four to Lucknow, and one each to Ahmedabad and Chandigarh as the airport struggled to handle the volume of traffic during the downpour.
Waterlogging paralysed traffic around Terminal 3 and the underpass linking the airport to Vasant Kunj, compounding the disruption for passengers travelling to and from IGI.
More than 550 flights were delayed at IGI Airport during Friday’s disruption, according to Flightradar24 data cited by The Times of India.
IndiGo and Air India both issued advisories asking passengers to check their flight status before leaving for the airport and to allow extra time given slow road movement.
The IMD’s red alert signals the most severe warning level, reserved for extremely heavy rainfall expected to cause significant disruption to daily life and infrastructure.
Delhi has faced repeated bouts of airport disruption this monsoon season, with heavy rain periodically triggering diversions and delays at IGI in recent weeks.
IGI Airport is one of the busiest in the country, typically handling well over a thousand flight movements a day, meaning disruptions there tend to cascade across the wider domestic network.
Passengers travelling to and from Delhi in the coming days have been advised to monitor airline communications closely given the ongoing unsettled weather pattern.
Photo by Ravi Dwivedi, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0
Discover more from Times Release
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.