For passengers, relatives, it was an endless wait

For scores of people, the foggiest morning of the year was spent waiting for their loved ones at the airport, while for passengers it was spent in a haze of delays, cancellations and diversions. HT reports.

For scores of people, the foggiest morning of the year was spent waiting for their loved ones at the airport, while for passengers it was spent in a haze of delays, cancellations and diversions.

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Abdul Mannar Khan (53) had been waiting for his son Yaseer Khan at the airport since 3 am.

"My son is coming home for New Year and we all were waiting for him eagerly. But I have been waiting here for 10 hours now. All I have come to know is that the flight has been diverted to Jaipur. My son has no information about when his flight will take off from there,” Khan said. His son boarded the Air India flight from Dubai to New Delhi.

Like Khan, Kiran Sharma, with her two children, also waited at the airport for her husband to arrive.

"He took a flight from Abu Dhabi that was supposed to reach at 5.50am but we waited till 1pm. We had no idea where he was all this time as the only information displayed on the boards was that the flight had been delayed," said Sharma.

The condition at the departure waiting area was worse with passengers forced to sleep on the floor. "There are no seats inside the airport and people are sleeping on the floors. The flushes in the washroom are not working. I was supposed to go to Guwahati by the 6.30 flight but it got delayed by more than 7 hours," said Namrata Mehta.

Meanwhile, the airport MeT department, had a workshop on Fog Prediction on Friday. "This year we have added Runway Visual Range equipment to aid pilots that help a lot of them land with ease," said RK Jenamani, director in-charge, MeT, IGI Airport.