From 7 February to 30 March 2019, the flying operation of nearly 5,000 flights, in and out of Mumbai airport have been cancelled for six hours on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays. Due to some repair work of the two runways at Mumbai’s Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport, such planned closer has been scheduled. If you have plans to fly out, in or out of Mumbai between 7th Feb and 30th Mar, you may have to recheck because this may cause some inconveniences to the passengers like higher airfares and possible delays on these dates.
This is nothing but a routine repair work that is to carry out in every six-seven years usually. The airport is re-carpeting and relaying the two cross runways at Mumbai International Airport. So the
airport will be shut for six hours i.e. from 11am to 5 pm on every Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays. All flights, during this time, domestic or international have been cancelled.
But 21st March which is Thursday, will be an exception. Amid this period, only on this day the airport will operate full day, as always.
Between this course, on each day, 230 flights will be cancelled on an average. Which will result in the cancellations of over 4,800 flights till the end of March.
Some airlines have rescheduled their flights, even advancing their departures to make the deadline. The delayed morning flights that can’t take off or land before 11am, may be grounded or diverted, as per the suitability. So it would be better to check with your airline if you’re flying on these dates.
Moreover international flights will be prioritized for take-offs and landings on either side of the closure time and this could lead to delays of domestic flights as well.
Quite naturally, since less number of flights will operate on these dates, the airfares are likely to go up. Most of the major domestic airlines have put out a list of their affected flights.
Likewise, this month Bengaluru’s Kempegowda International Airport is also going to be closed for a few hours for 11 days due to Aero India Show and its rehearsals. The flights will be cancelled here between 14 and 24 February.
