Fani ripples: 81 northeast flights cancelled due to bad weather in other states

GUWAHATI: As an aftereffect of Cyclone Fani that made landfall in Bhubaneshwar and moved across West Bengal before entering Bangladesh, 81 flights across the northeast have been cancelled due to the adverse climatic conditions.
Though all airports in the northeast are operational, flights have been cancelled mostly because of the air traffic that has been disrupted in Kolkata and Bhubaneswar, an airport official said.
The cancellations have left hundreds of passengers stranded at the Lokpriya Gopinath Bordoloi International (LGBI) Airport.
The northeastern regional headquarters of the Airports Authority of India (AAI) based in Guwahati said that a total 59 flights - including the ones scheduled for arrival and departure - were cancelled from Guwahati Airport on Saturday. As many as 41 Indigo, 10 Spice Jet, 2 Air India, 4 Alliance Air and 2 GoAir flights were cancelled from the Guwahati Airport, mostly due to inclement weather conditions in West Bengal and Odisha.
"The devastating effects of Cyclone Fani have disrupted flight operations at the airports under the North Eastern Regional Headquarters of the AAI. Though all the airports in the northeastern region are operational, due to bad weather conditions at airports located outside the northeastern region, the connecting flights have been cancelled by the airlines. All the airports in the northeast are open for normal operations," said a spokesperson of the AAI.
A total of 8 Indigo flights that were scheduled to arrive and depart from the MBB Airport in Agartala also remained cancelled on Saturday. In Dimapur Airport, two Indigo flights had to been cancelled in view of the adverse climatic conditions. Spice Jet cancelled two flights - one scheduled to arrive and another depart from Lilabari airport in Lakhimpur district.
In Dibrugarh Airport, Indigo cancelled two flights, while Spice Jet cancelled another two flights from the upper Assam town. A total of six Indigo flights that were scheduled to arrive at and depart from Imphal Airport were also remained cancelled.
In view of the Met departments' advisory, a total of nine Guwahati-bound flights and another 14 flights scheduled to depart from the Guwahati airport were cancelled on Friday.
Though Kolkata airport has reopened on Saturday morning, the airlines are yet to start full-fledged operations. However, the AAI officials said that efforts are on to normalize flight operations from northeast at the earliest.