BENGALURU: With the Chennai airport closing down its operations for 16 hours due to strong winds and heavy rains caused by Cyclone Fengal, 16 flights, including five international ones, have been diverted to the Kempegowda International Airport (KIA). Trains too suffered some impact.
A spokesperson of airport operator, Bangalore International Airport Limited, said that 11 domestic flights were diverted. “This included four IndiGo flights and an equal number of Air India flights, one flight of Akasa Air, Spicejet and Star Air,” he said.
The international ones which were diverted from Chennai to Bengaluru were two flights from Abu Dhabi to Chennai (Indigo and Etihad), an Emirates flight from Dubai to Chennai, an Indigo flight from Bangkok to Chennai and an Oman Air flight from Muscat to Chennai.
Of all days, Star Air was operating a special flight on Saturday from Bengaluru to Chennai. An airline spokesperson said, “Our scheduled flight S5 9215 with 30 passengers which left from Bengaluru at 8.09 am to Chennai had to return to Bengaluru due to bad weather there. It returned to KIA at 10.17 am.”
Flights to Chennai did not take off from KIA:
An IndiGo source said that seven flights from Bengaluru to Chennai and the same flights in the return direction could not be operated on Saturday.
Rail impact:
Due to a bridge getting suspended due to the cyclone, the following trains have been short terminated. 12610 Mysore-Chennai this has been short terminated at Tiruvallur station;
Lal Bagh Express frGm Chennai to Bangalore (12607) commenced at Tiruvallur station while the
Chennai-Bangalore Mail (12657) from Chennai to Bengaluru will begin from Chennai Beach station.