Air travel ground to a crawl at the nation's busiest hub, Indira Gandhi International Airport (IGIA), on Friday morning as a severe technical glitch in the Air Traffic Control (ATC) system led to the delay of over 300 flights.
The disruption, which reportedly began late Thursday evening, stems from issues with the Automatic Message Switching System (AMSS). This system is crucial as it feeds information, including automatic flight plans, to the Auto Track System (AMS) used by air traffic controllers.
Due to the technical failure, controllers have been forced to prepare flight plans manually, a time-consuming process that has resulted in significant air traffic congestion and mounting delays.
Flight tracking website Flightradar24.com indicated that departures at the Delhi airport were facing approximately 50-minute delays.
The Airports Authority of India (AAI), which manages air traffic control and navigation, confirmed the issue. "Flight operations at Delhi Airport are experiencing delays due to a technical issue in the Automatic Message Switching System (AMSS), which supports Air Traffic Control data," the AAI stated in a post on X.
The state-owned body assured that technical teams are working "to restore the system at the earliest."
The ripple effect was immediately felt across the aviation sector.
Major carriers, including IndiGo, Air India, SpiceJet, and Akasa Air, issued advisories to passengers, confirming their flights were impacted by the ATC system failure in Delhi.
The Delhi International Airport Ltd (DIAL), the operator of IGIA, acknowledged the severity of the situation, confirming that flight operations were "experiencing delays" and that their team was "actively working with all stakeholders... to resolve it at the earliest."
IGIA handles over 1,500 flight movements daily, underscoring the critical nature of the system failure and the extensive effort required by controllers to manually manage the high volume of traffic.
The technical teams are actively working to restore the functionality of the Air Traffic Control (ATC) system at the airport.
(With inputs from Agencies)