Know about this latest sensational news regarding Chennai airport!!
Posted on: 03/May/2022 9:51:37 AM
It has been 4 long years since the cross runway operations were suspended at the Chennai airport due to an incident. Later in this year, AAI or Airport Authority of India would be resuming the cross runway operations at this airport. It must not be forgotten that cross runway operations were suspended because 2 aircrafts were present on the same runway at the same time.
It is noteworthy that in runway operations both the main as well as secondary runways would be in use at the same time to reduce congestion, bring down flight delays and increase the number of flights handled in the peak hours of time. There are 2 runways present at Chennai airport. The primary runway is of length of 12500 feet and the secondary runway is of length of 9500 feet.
Truth is that both these runways are not in use now. It was brought out by some officials belonging to AAI that there are plans to bring back simultaneous operations to enhance the airside capacity and expand the number of flights operated per hour etc.
Every hour, currently 36 flights are handled now at the airport and it might increase to 56 if both runways operated simultaneously. In another few months, resurfacing works of the secondary runway would get over and it is now said that both runways would be back in use after resurfacing work gets over. The AAI officer mentioned that a safety study would be conducted by a team of officials and a report would be sent to DGCA or directorate general of civil aviation. He added that after getting safety clearance then simultaneous operations might resume at the airport.
An official then spoke about how AAI has been considering 2 combinations. In the first one, when the main runway is used for both arrival and departure operations and just departures would be allowed on the secondary runway. In the second one, a secondary runway would be used for both arrival and departure and there would be departures only on the main runway.
The sources from AAI pointed out that theoretically it would be possible to handle 56 flights per hour but in reality or practically it would have few issues. Handling many flights per hour would not be an easy task. During bad weather conditions and when visibility is low, this would not be possible. In the year 2018, cross runway operations were suspended for a few months after commencement due to the presence of 2 flights on the same runway.
