Air and rail traffic hit hard due to fog in North India

Dense fog continues to engulf North India including Delhi, Punjab, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh. As thick fog descended upon Delhi on Monday, air and rail operations were majorly affected causing great inconvenience to thousands of flyers across the country. Poor visibility at Indira Gandhi International Airport raised a hue and cry in Mumbai as 28 arrivals and 22 departures were delayed by over an hour on Monday.

Here a look at today's situation at some major airports in North India:

Indira Gandhi International Airport, Delhi

The visibility reduced to zero today morning as well leading to diversions, delays and cancellations of flights. Air operations came to a standstill disturbing around 80 domestic and international flights. The early morning visibility fell below 50 metres, which is the minimum requirement for landing under poor visibility conditions using the CAT-III B instrument landing system (ILS). In the span of 3 hours from 6 a.m. to 9 a.m., when fog was very dense, about 60 flights were delayed and five flights were cancelled. The flight to Dhaka during this span was delayed by 5 hours and the one to London by almost 4 and half hours. The condition of fog in Delhi improved by afternoon.

Visibility- The visibility was zero from 5 a.m. to 10 a.m.

Guru Ram Das Jee International Airport, Amritsar

Five flights to Delhi before 11 a.m. have been cancelled and five more to fly after 3 p.m. have been delayed. Flights to other destinations are running on time.

Visibility-The visibility was zero till afternoon.

Chaudhary Charan Singh International Airport, Lucknow

Since 6 a.m. till noon two flights to Delhi have been cancelled while four were delayed. Here as well, the situation will improve by late afternoon.

Visibility- The visibility was 50 meters from 7.30 a.m. to 8 a.m. and it increased to 100 meters after that.

The annual occurrence of fog in Delhi hits flight schedules greatly. As predicted earlier, winter arrived in North India as we stepped into mid-December and foggy conditions are expected to prevail till February, in intervals.

Meanwhile, rail traffic was also affected as fog engulfed the plains of North India. Several trains have been running late since Monday on the north-eastern route. The rail traffic was thrown out of gear as major trains including Sealdah Rajdhani, Brahmaputra Mail, Magadh Express were reported to be running late by almost 8 hours.

Click here to check today's fog updates for Delhi, major airports and railways in India.

picture courtesy- thisismoney.co.uk