DGCA approves RESA work at Mangalore International Airport

MANGALORE : The Director-General of Civil Aviation has granted approval for construction of part parallel taxiway and improvement of runway end safety areas (RESA) at Mangalore International Airport (MIA) at Kenjar near here. In development of RESA at runway ends at MIA, works are being executed adjacent to runway. To facilitate the works, flight operations cannot be carried out due to safety reasons, J T Radhakrishna, airport director said.
Hence the runways and its operation will be closed from 11.30pm to 7.30am with effect from November 1 to April 30, 2015. Accordingly, airlines have rescheduled the flights, especially those bound for the Middle-East. Radhakrishna told TOI that the slope at RESA at MIA is at 2%, well within the permissible limit of 5% prescribed by DGCA. “With the works approved by DGCA, we will bring the slope at RESA to 0% and comply fully with norms.”
Incidentally, the correction in slope is being carried out on a recommendation by a committee set up by DGCA that inspected runways of table top airports, Radhakrishna said. “The committee among its various recommendations had suggested the slope at RESA be brought to zero. The other recommendations are minor in nature and have been attended to,” he said. The committee carried out the survey post IX812 crash off MIA in May 2010.
At present, parking bays are connected to the main runway with one taxiway. This is leading to a delay of flight up to 10 minutes in many cases. To avoid these delays, the parallel taxiway works has been taken up, he said, adding once this work is completed; it will provide a second connection from the runway to the parking bays and completely sort out the delay of flights on this count. This work is expected to be completed by December 2015.