Chennai airport to handle wide-body planes soon
Posted on: 24/Oct/2019 10:02:10 AM
Widebody planes operated on the international routes would be handled by the Chennai airport. Fantastic isn’t it!!
For this, the Chennai airport is getting facelift now. Relaying, strengthening of a few taxiways and parts of apron area are being carried out now at this famous airport by AAI or Airport Authority of India.
It is brought out that the strengthening work is needed as this part of apron and taxiways are now being used to pushback and taxi narrow-body planes such as A320, B737 operated on the domestic routes. Next year in 2020, an integrated terminal would become functional and AAI would be moving international flights there.
From the apron in front of the international terminal to the space in front of the new integrated terminal, all Code E planes including wide-body planes like B777 and B787 would be moved. This was confirmed by a senior AAI official. He added that the international passengers would be using the new terminal.
The important point is this work is also part of the move to strengthen a few taxiways to make them strong enough to handle big planes. It is worthy to note that old taxiways have been in use for a long time and they need refurbishing. The old taxiways are upgraded now to handle the load of bigger planes.
An official mentioned that 2 or 3 taxiways to which planes are now being pushed back for taxiing to the runway cannot handle Code E planes. It is now said that this was one of the reasons why jumbo planes like Air China could not be brought close to the terminal when the president of China visited Chennai recently.
Flight movements must not get hampered and for this, the strengthening work is carried out in parts. Information is a part of the apron in the space in front of the site that has been cordoned off and earthmovers are used for the work. The space in front of the site is where the integrated terminal would be coming up is known. The same work would have to be done near the international terminal and the domestic terminal also,
