Rourkela: As bad weather continues to play spoilsport dashing the denizens’ hope of direct flight connectivity to Kolkata, Rourkela remains cut off by air. Sundargarh district has been experiencing extreme foggy weather conditions for the last several days.
According to a source in Alliance Air, the visibility factor led to cancellation of flights from Rourkela Airport to Bhubaneswar and Kolkata. Rourkela Airport was supposed to start direct flights to Kolkata from December 26. However, bad weather has prevented the flight’s take off giving a harrowing time to those who had booked tickets.
The source informed that the visibility remained below 3,500 feet Thursday and it is dangerous for the plane to land in such weather conditions. Meanwhile, this was bad news for the 37 persons from Rourkela and 36 from Kolkata who had booked the tickets. Similarly, 57 persons had booked tickets to Rourkela and 54 to Bhubaneswar through the lone service provider Alliance Air.
The visual flight rules (VFR) is the answer to this problem. “With VFR trained staff the plane can land with the visibility of just 1,500 feet,” said Bimal Bisi, president of Sachetan Nagarika Mancha, who is waging almost a lone battle for the smoothening of the flight connectivity.
Instrument landing system (ILS) remains a costly affair at this moment and there are other issues that are preventing the installation of the equipment here. Meanwhile, four staffers of Airport Authority of India (AAI) underwent one-day training for VFR recently. In all probability, they would be in a position to handle it from January 2.
Meanwhile, Jual Oram, Sundargarh MP and Member of Parliamentary Standing Committee for Defence, has written to Jyotiraditya Scindia, Union Minister for Civil Aviation, regarding issues faced by the Rourkela Airport.
In his letter, Oram has mentioned about the flight condition at the airport and sought actions in this regard. “The airport land belongs to the state government who has leased it to Rourkela Steel Plant. This is a major roadblock in the development of the aerodrome as the AAI is unable to undertake any developmental work here.” Oram has further requested that the land should be immediately transferred to AAI and some “RSP quarters be given to the agency for its staff.”
Besides, he has also requested to start direct ATR flights to Delhi from this airport so that it would benefit the people and also the Smart City’s development. He has stressed that the airport should have a night landing system so that planes from other areas can fly in during night time, which will benefit the city immensely. The airport is in urgent need of the ILS, he said in his letter.
While the MP is busy in pursuing the development of the airport, passengers continue to be tormented owing to the erratic flight connectivity. The Kolkata flight will be tri-weekly and will operate on alternate days of the week starting from Tuesday.
By Rajesh Mohanty, OP