Now, taxiway lights on the blink

Power problems came back to haunt the Delhi airport yet again. But this time, it wasn’t Terminal 3’s turn to plunge into darkness. Sidhartha Roy reports.

Power problems came back to haunt the Delhi airport yet again. But this time, it wasn’t Terminal 3’s turn to plunge into darkness.

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On Wednesday evening, the ground lights of one of the taxiways went on blink due to which two aircrafts of a domestic carrier, that were about to land, had to make a ‘go around’. Due to the problem, the main runway (28/10) of the Indira Gandhi International Airport (IGIA) could not be used for sometime.

The incident occurred during the peak hour at 8.30 pm on Wednesday when the lights of one of the taxiways of runway 10 stopped working suddenly. At that time, two aircraft were lined up to land at the runway from Dwarka side.

“Though there was no problem with the runway lights, the aircraft would have taken the taxiway to exit the runway after landing. But the taxiway lights went out and the pilots were asked to make a go around,” said an airport source. “It seems the taxiway lights were affected by the jet blast of another aircraft,” he added.

Instead of landing, the aircraft made a go-around and came back later to land, slightly delaying the flights. The power problem, however, was rectified quickly so that the runway could be used again.

“The taxiway lights developed some problem at 8.30pm on Wednesday but the problem was rectified immediately,” said a spokesman of the private airport operator Delhi International Airport Ltd.