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Air India flight heads to Russia to ferry stranded passengers
According to Air India officials, the ferry flight is expected to reach Sokol airport in Magadan by around midnight
An Air India ferry flight on Wednesday took off for Russia’s remote town of Magadan, where 216 passengers have been stranded since Tuesday evening after a San Francisco-bound flight made an emergency landing due to a technical fault in one of its engines, the airline said.
Read here: Air India plane stranded in Russia a potential red flag for global air transport
Civil aviation minister Jyotiraditya Scindia also confirmed the development and assured safe ferrying of the stranded passengers and 16 crew members from Magadan to San Francisco.
According to Air India officials, the ferry flight took off from Mumbai at around 3.30pm on Wednesday and is expected to reach Sokol airport in Magadan by around midnight.
“An Air India team is on board the flight to provide any support that the passengers and staff at GDX (Magadan) may require. The ferry flight is carrying essentials in addition to sufficient food to cater to all passengers on the onward flight scheduled from GDX to San Francisco (SFO). The aircraft operating the ferry flight will take all passengers and crew onward to San Francisco on 08 June 2023,” the airline said in a statement.
On Tuesday, flight AI 173 took off from Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International (IGI) Airport at 4.20am and was scheduled to reach San Francisco at 7pm (IST). The aircraft, however, landed at Sokol airport at 1.30pm after it developed a technical snag in one of its engines.
“We have a Boeing 777-200 that took off today...the flying time is around six-and-a-half hours, it will land there and take on board all passengers and fly to San Francisco safely,” Scindia told reporters in Delhi.
The Tata Group-owned Air India does not have any staff based in Magadan or in Russia. It, therefore, had to take the assistance of Rossiya Airlines – one of the oldest and largest air carriers of the Russian Federation.
Read here: Where is Magadan in Russia, where Air India plane with 232 people is stranded
Airline officials said the stranded passengers were moved to a school near the airport. According to Russia state-owned news agency Sputnik, minister of transport of Magadan region, Aleksey Siorpas, said women with children or pregnant women were accommodated in the dormitory of a medical college in the city.
Besides India, the United States is also “closely monitoring” the situation keeping in mind that there may be American citizens among those stranded.
“We are aware of a US-bound flight that had to make an emergency landing in Russia and are continuing to monitor that situation closely. I’m not able to confirm how many US citizens were aboard the flight at this time,” state department deputy spokesperson Vedant Patel told reporters on Tuesday.
“It was a flight that was bound for the US. So, it is, of course, likely that there are American citizens on board,” Patel added.
Meanwhile, the stranded passengers complained of lack of amenities.
Air India officials, however, said that all support was being provided to the passengers in the best possible manner through round-the-clock liaison with the ministry of external affairs, Consulate General of India in Vladivostok and Russian authorities.
The airline has also activated a hotline number to address queries in the matter.
“While passengers have complained of inconvenience, one must understand that the aircraft had to land in rural Siberia due to an emergency. The pilot had to fly two hours away from his route to ensure that he landed at a safe place,” an Air India official said, seeking anonymity.
A second airline official said: “Sokol airport has a footfall of 400,000 per year, whereas the daily footfall of Delhi airport is 200,000. It (Magadan) has no five-star hotels due to which the airline was forced to make arrangements in the hall of a school.”
