DGCA issues show cause notices to Air India, SpiceJet for fog-related flight diversions at Delhi airport

New Delhi: Aviation watchdog DGCA has issued show cause notices to Air India and SpiceJet for not deploying pilots trained to operate in low visibility conditions, following diversions of various flights amid dense fog at the Delhi airport in late December.

During December 25-28 last year, flight operations were significantly impacted at the Delhi airport, and nearly 60 flights of various airlines were diverted due to dense fog.

Last month, airport sources had said that a total of 58 flights were diverted due to bad weather between 0000 hours of December 25 to 0600 hours of December 28.

The sources had also said that most of the flights had to be diverted, as the pilots were not trained to operate flights in low visibility conditions.

On Thursday, a senior DGCA official said show cause notices have been issued to Air India and SpiceJet.

The notices are in relation to flight diversions that happened due to the airlines not deploying pilots trained to operate in low visibility conditions, the official added.

Air India and SpiceJet did not offer any comments on the regulator issuing show cause notices to them.

It could not be immediately ascertained whether any other airline has been served show cause notice by the regulator with respect to fog-related flight diversions.

On December 29, Civil Aviation Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia termed the fog issue as a 'transitory phenomenon' and said that this year the situation has been slightly unprecedented in terms of the density of fog.

He had also said the civil aviation ministry was monitoring the situation on a daily basis.

"Fog issue is an issue that we encounter 15-20 days every year... this year, there has been unprecedented fog for the last three or four days. We are coordinating with all the airlines to make sure that they have CAT II and CAT III-trained pilots during fog hours, thereby easing congestion," Scindia had told PTI.

CAT II and III requirement pertains to operating flights in low visibility conditions.