Flights Will Be Rescheduled At The Chennai Airport For Taxiway Work

In a bid to improve operations at the Chennai Airport, Airports Authority of India(AAI) has started the construction of new taxiways.

Airport authorities have announced that due to this construction, 2 international flights will be rescheduled and many domestic flights will have to use the second runway.

Here are all the details about it-

• 4 exit taxiways have been under construction and the work to link them to the main runway will begin next month.
• AAI is also making a parallel taxiway on the north side of the main runway.
• For this purpose, the main runway will be closed for a few hours every day, for about 9 months.
• The runway will be closed in 2 phases – from 12:30 p.m. to 8 p.m. in July and August, and from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. from September.
• The departure of a Saudi Airlines flight has been rescheduled from 12:30 p.m. to 11:15 a.m. The airline will be given a different schedule during winters.
• Air India flights and a Cathay Pacific flight will also be rescheduled however the timings have not been specified for now.

According to an AAI official, they have selected non-peak hours to do this construction work because wide-bodied aircrafts generally don’t operate during this time.

He also said that AAI has done all the assessments and discussions. All airlines have agreed to use the second runway and reschedule flights that fall within this closure period.

The rapid exit taxiways and the parallel taxiway are being constructed to reduce the time taken by the airplane to move out of the runway after landing. It will help airplanes to move out in less than 70 seconds after landing.

With new taxiways, Chennai Airport, which currently handles 450 flights daily, will be able to handle 500 airplanes per day.