Plane removed, operations resume at Mumbai airport runway
September 5th, 2011 - 11:05 am ICT by IANSMumbai, Sep 5 (IANS) Nearly 75 hours after it skidded and got stuck in mud, the stranded Turkish Airlines plane was finally removed from the Mumbai airport runway early Monday, an official said. Normal flight operations soon resumed.
The plane was removed from the spot near the main runway at around 1 a.m. and towed to the Air India hangar at 6.45 a.m.
Just before 7 a.m., the main runway - 0927 - was handed over to the Air Traffic Control to resume normal operations.
The first flight to take off was a Mumbai-Kolkata Air India flight AI-675 at 7.07 a.m. The first arrival was from Hyderabad, SG 403, at 7.12 a.m., the official told IANS.
The runway was shut early Friday after the Turkish Airlines plane skidded off after landing and got stuck in the mud following heavy rains. All 104 passengers, including 11 crew were safely evacuated.
In the past three days, the airport had a harrowing time as all operations had to be diverted to the secondary runway. Over a dozen flights were diverted and around half a dozen cancelled.
Besides, the airport had to deal with one emergency landing (Spicejet on Saturday) and a bomb scare (Jet Airways, Sunday).
During the same period, the airport was forced to suspend all operations on at least five occasions due to poor visibility and heavy rains lashing the city since Sep 1.
- Turkish Airlines plane skids; Mumbai airport shut till Saturday - Sep 03, 2011
- Mumbai airport main runway shut till 11 p.m. Saturday - Sep 03, 2011
- Herculean efforts on at Mumbai to move stuck aircraft - Sep 03, 2011
- Mumbai airport's main runway not yet functional - Sep 04, 2011
- Sukhoi skids at Pune airport, flights hit - Apr 19, 2012
- Plane skids off runway at Kochi airport, two injured - Aug 29, 2011
- Air India flight skids off runway in Kanpur - Jul 20, 2011
- Turkish Airways plane goes off runway in Mumbai during heavy rainfall - Sep 03, 2011
- Air India plane stuck on runway, operations hit - Oct 23, 2010
- Spicejet flight makes emergency landing - Sep 03, 2011
- Gulf Air passenger plane skids off runway in southwest India - Aug 29, 2011
- Mumbai airport reopened after five-hour closure for repairs - Apr 23, 2011
- Kite disrupts landings at China airport - May 05, 2012
- Heavy fog hit hard air, rail traffic (Evening Lead) - Dec 27, 2010
- Close shave at Kerala airport? - Dec 09, 2011
Tags: air india, air india flight, air traffic control, airport runway, bomb scare, dozen flights, early monday, emergency landing, first flight, flight operations, half a dozen, hangar, heavy rains, jet airways, mud, mumbai airport, poor visibility, secondary runway, spicejet, turkish airlines