Chennai runway to be closed for six hours for rubber removal work
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No flight can land or take-off at the city airport between 1 pm and 7 pm on Saturday.
“The airport runway will be closed for six hours, as we plan to undertake the rubber removal work in the middle of the airstrip,” said airport director H.S. Suresh.
The Airports Authority of India (AAI) has been doing milling work at the runway without disturbing the schedule of the airlines, but now it has decided to close the runway completely for six hours on Saturday to finish the rubber removal work at a stretch at the centre of the airstrip.
“We completed milling work near the Pallavaram end of the runway last week. We will start the rubber removal work at the Trident hotel side of the runway on July 2 and this will go on for five days. During that period only part of the runway will be available for aircraft operations,” said Suresh.
The airport director said that AAI is installing a temporary precision approach path indicator (PAPI) that would help pilots in their approach to the airport, before closing part of the runway near the Trident hotel side for repair work.
Airline companies have advanced some of its flights and cancelled a few on Saturday.
“We are not complaining because the closure is only for one day. But then such a precarious situation would not have arisen had Airports Authority of India (AAI) opened the secondary runway before starting milling work on the primary runway,” said an airline official.
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