NEW DELHI: For the third time in the last five months, lavatory-related issues pose a problem for Air India passengers.
A flight carrying 134 passengers from Delhi to Pune on Tuesday could not take off from Indira Gandhi International Airport (IGIA) due to a technical issue with the toilets and an alternate flight was arranged for passengers after four hours.
Passengers were seated inside flight AI 2982, an Airbus 321 Neo model, for 75 minutes before being finally asked to deboard. They were accommodated in another aircraft after going through security checks again, it is understood.
Sources told that it was not a case of clogged toilets.
"The waste tank in the flight which is a common one for all the toilets needs to be emptied before departure. Though engineers were trying their best, it was not getting emptied due to some technical issue. This is a narrow body flight with just four toilets. These are machines and such glitches can happen," a source said.
Meanwhile, boarding of passengers had started. "Since it was taking some time to rectify the technical fault, passengers were deboarded and put on another aircraft. It was not a major issue as within a short time the tank got emptied and the aircraft was used for subsequent flights," another source said.
It was not similar to the issue of clogged toilets as happened in the flights earlier this year, the sources stressed. "The flight had not yet departed. The entire flight is fully cleaned before the start of any trip. There is no chance of any blockage before the start of the trip," the source added.
The flight was to depart from IGAI at 1.05 pm and reach Pune at 3.20 pm. Instead, the alternative flight took off at 5.31 pm and reached Pune by 7.58 pm.
An Air India spokesperson said in a statement, "Flight AI2982, operating from Delhi to Pune, was delayed because of a maintenance task identified prior to departure. It required additional time for rectification. Our ground colleagues in Delhi airport extended support to the passengers to minimise the inconvenience caused because of this unforeseen delay."