Authority to nail down noisy planes

Residents of Vasant Kunj are not the only ones spending sleepless nights listening to the noise of aircraft flying low over their houses. The Delhi airport authorities are now monitoring noise from aircrafts landing at the new runway, reports Sidhartha Roy.

Residents of Vasant Kunj are not the only ones spending sleepless nights listening to the noise of aircraft flying low over their houses. The Delhi airport authorities are now monitoring noise from aircrafts landing at the new runway.

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Planes arriving at Indira Gandhi International (IGI) Airport use the new runway to land and the main runway to take-off. The flight path of these aircraft is over Vasant Kunj and the noise created by them has become a nightmare for the residents.

“Even earlier we could hear aircraft noise but in the last few months it has become unbearable as the planes fly right above our colony,” said Ashok Verma, a resident. “The planes fly so low and make so much noise that my flat starts vibrating. I haven’t had a sound sleep in the last three months,” he said.

The Vasant Kunj RWA’s federation recently wrote to the airport operator, Delhi International Airport Ltd. (DIAL), Civil Aviation Minister Praful Patel and the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA).

“The machine would give details about sounds produced by each aircraft and we would also be able to assess at what time the most noise creating planes arrive,” said a senior airport official on condition of anonymity. The data collected by DIAL would be provided to the DGCA, Airports Authority of India and all the airlines.

IGIA’s new and third runway was opened for commercial operations on September 25. Earlier, planes used to land at the airport’s secondary runway and their flight path was over areas like AIIMS, Safdarjang Enclave, R.K. Puram and Vasant Vihar.

At present the flight path is over the ridge and areas like Rangpuri, Vasant Kunj, Mehrauli and Chhattarpur.

Aircraft noise is the second largest source of environmental noise.