It was the fourth time since August 3 that the service was halted due to a problem in the runway. Earlier on Sunday, too, the same problem occurred and the service was briefly stopped. TIA General Manager Dinesh Prasad Shrestha said that the solution provided by TIA was temporary and the runway requires full-fledged renovation, the problem may occur again anytime. [break]
On Friday, incoming flight of Royal Bhutan was diverted back to Paro as the runway was closed for half an hour from 2 pm for maintenance as a pothole was seen in the intersection C and D of the runway, according to an official at TIA.
Likewise, incoming flights of China Eastern Airlines, Jet Airways and Air India were kept on hold and the scheduled flight of Thai Airways from Kathmandu was delayed. More than half a dozen domestic flights were also delayed.
“The runaway is in poor condition and is facing problems due to frequent changes in the weather patterns. Hence, we have deployed a rapid action team to solve the problem immediately but this is not a permanent solution,” Shrestha said.
Shrestha added that though the flights had been resumed on Friday afternoon after maintenance, it will again be carrying out maintenance work at night after the airport closes.
The airport closes from midnight to 5:30 am in the morning.
According to TIA, no studies have been carried out so far to examine the condition of the runway since it was constructed 38 years back. The runway constructed in 1966 was made to handle small aircrafts but now it has to handle aircrafts that weigh up to 300 tons.
TIA said that it has been difficult to provide permanent solution to the runway as TIA has a single runway.
Recently, the government has already hired a Spanish company to conduct a study on cost, time and other technical aspects for renovating the runway.
“Once we receive the report from the company, we will renovate the runway to make sure that the problems are solved permanently,” said Shrestha. The company will submit the final report in two months.
Related story
Flights halted at TIA due to pothole in the runway
