Mumbai airport to freeze more flights in winter season

India’s congested Mumbai airport has put a freeze on additional flights in the upcoming winter season and is now proposing to appoint a consultant to help it increase capacity utilization.The landlocked Chatrapati Shivaji International Airport of Mumbai slipped to No. 2 when Indira Gandhi International Airport in New Delhi handled some 26.1 million passengers traffic during 2009-10.

The airport has 650 aircraft movements a day and can’t handle more since it plans to close the main runway between 1 November and 1 May every day between 9am and 6pm.We are maintaining status quo as per operations in the last season,said a spokesperson of Mumbai International Airport Pvt Ltd Mial, the company that runs the airport.Last year we reconstructed the secondary runway and closed it for six months. We are now planning to resurface and enhance the main runway with two objectives: The main runway has reached the end of its lifecycle, it was recarpeted some 7-10 years back. Secondly, we want to make it Code-F compliant to allow Airbus A380 operations,the spokesman said.

Airlines are worried that a runway closure during the peak winter months, which see a lot of foreign tourist traffic, coupled with fog in north India, could throw operations out of gear and, therefore, increase airfares.We understand that runway carpeting is important for safety but they could have chosen another time period,said a domestic airline official who asked not to be identified. Most airlines have filed for new flights from Mumbai knowing well they won’t get it.The winter schedule starts at the end of October and is approved by the aviation regulator every season.Mial claims the secondary runway will be able to accommodate existing traffic and dates can’t be shifted to the summer months because it will be the rainy season.

The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) is yet to grant permission for the closure, an official at the regulator said, asking not to be named.We have asked them to submit the details and will review the matter soon,the official said.MIAl said it is trying to increase capacity at the airport and had sent a team to UK’s Gatwick airport in June to study how the airport manages 55-60 aircraft movements per hour with a single runway compared with Mumbai’s 30-36 that has two.MIAL has submitted a proposal to Airports Authority of India, which runs all of the country’s air traffic, to hire a consultant to study and identify areas where the airport can be improved and recommend changes so that more flights can be added.The airport can go up to 750 aircraft movements a day when the modernization is completed, the spokesman said. IGI Airport is already handling an average 720 aircraft movements a day after a $3 billion expansion that came to an end this year.