An Air India evacuation flight that took off from Kuwait, under Vande Bharat Mission, landed in Hyderabad’s Rajiv Gandhi International Airport on Saturday night. The special flight brought 163 Indian nationals, including two infants, from Kuwait amid the novel coronavirus-induced lockdown.
“The AI 988 plane of Air India landed at Hyderabad International Airport at 10.07 p.m.,” a senior security officer at the airport told The Hindu. He said that the flight was initially scheduled to land at 9.30 p.m. and later at 9.51 p.m., and it was further delayed due to bad weather. It took off to Kuwait from RGIA at 11 a.m. on Saturday.
He said that the aircraft was received at a specially prepared bay and all passengers, including the crew members underwent an initial temperature test using thermal guns and later underwent thermal screening by special cameras installed near the aerobridge.
The Vande Bharat Mission, the biggest ever evacuation drive of over 15,000 Indian citizens stranded across the globe, involves 64 flights through various Indian airports.
Sources said that the entire airport was sanitised and social distancing among passengers were enforced at all areas of passenger movement.
“All arriving passengers and aircraft crew were brought out from the aircraft in a lot of 20-25 passengers. Glass shields were provided at each manned immigration counter to avoid any direct contact between the passengers and Immigration officers,” they said.
The concerned airline, their ground handling staff and airport personnel were available to guide the passengers and to enforce the social distancing norms.
Every baggage was sanitised using a disinfection tunnel integrated to the baggage belt and airport had kept fully sanitised baggage trolleys for passengers use.
They passengers were also provided with complimentary boxes, before sending them for quarantine for 14 days in the listed hostels preferred by them. There are three categories of hotels identified by the State government.
Cyberabad CP V.C. Sajjanar said if any passenger is found to have COVID-19 symptoms, they will be sent to a State-run hospital for tests.