Lucknow: Several flights were delayed, while at least five flights from four destinations were diverted to other cities in view of poor visibility due to dense fog on Friday.
Flights arriving from Hyderabad, Jaipur, Bengaluru and Indore were diverted as pilots were not qualified to land in poor visibility conditions, officials said.
However, two flights, IX 2815 and IX 2813, coming from Hyderabad which were diverted to Varanasi and Jaipur, landed at Lucknow airport at 11.31am and 12.02pm, respectively. Flight 6E6353 from Bengaluru was diverted to Jaipur, flight 6E7127 from Indore was diverted to Nagpur, and flight 6E7319 from Jaipur was also sent back to the originating airport.
"The pilots of these flights were not certified for the CAT III landing system, which enables pilots to land in any weather conditions or at any hour," an official source said.
Meanwhile, a flight for Dammam was cancelled due to low visibility and the crew flight's duty time limitations. The flight was supposed to take off at 6.30 am.
The cascading effect of flight delay due to fog was such that at least 12 flights bound for other cities experienced an average two-hour delay including IX 149 for Muscat took off at 2.41pm instead of its original scheduled time 7.30am, AI412 for Delhi at 10.50am instead of 8.55am, IX 2816 for Hyderabad at 1.04pm instead of 9am, 6E146 for Guwahati at 12.51pm instead of 9.10am, QP1401 for Bengaluru at 11.26am instead of 10.35am, 6E6902 for Patna at 12.02pm instead of 10.40am, S9315 for Aligarh at 3.12pm instead of 11.25am, SV891 for Jeddah departed at 5pm instead of 12.10pm, 6E6552 for Chandigarh left at 5.15 pm instead of 2.10 pm, IX 1118 for Pune left at 4.25pm instead of 2.50pm.
More than 10 flights arrived late by an average of one hour. Flight number 6E5264 from Mumbai arrived at 2.27am instead of 1.10am, IX 2815 from Varanasi landed at 11.32am instead of 8.10am, AI411 from Delhi came at 10.01am instead of 8.15am, 6E146 from Chandigarh came at 11.36am instead of 8.30am, 6E6552 from Guwahati came at 4.54pm instead of 1.40pm, while 6E6165 from Amritsar landed at 3.25pm instead of 1.55pm.