Bomb scare in Delhi delays Ranchi flight

Ranchi: The early morning Go Airways flight (G 8145) from Delhi was grounded at Palam airport after a false alarm by an anonymous caller about a passenger carrying weapons was sounded.
This caused harassment passengers and their relatives waiting at the airport got anxious. The aircraft was carrying 120 passengers.
The flight was scheduled to leave Delhi at 6.10 in the morning and land at Ranchi in its scheduled arrival time at 7.55am.
The passengers, who had already been cleared by the airport security were de-boarded and made to go through security checks again. The flight was finally cleared for take-off at 10am and it finally arrived in Ranchi at 12.20pm.
"I had come to receive my daughter who is studying in Delhi. No one from the airport authorities informed us anything after the flight got delayed. We got information only after media persons started arriving at the airport," said S Srivastava, businessman.
"I was supposed to attend a meeting in Jamshedpur in the afternoon and return by the evening flight. My whole schedule has gone haywire now," said Shashi, who identified with her first name only.
Airport director Anil Vikram feigned ignorance about the issue when contacted about the same.
"It is the duty of the airline operator to inform passengers about the delay and reasons behind it," Vikram said.
While the hoax caller is yet to be traced, the airport authorities conducted security drills soon after the flight landed. However, ML Verma, airport security incharge termed it a routine exercise.
"We are already on an alert and conduct regular security drills," Verma said.
This is the second such incident affecting Ranchi airport. Last year too, a Delhi bound flight was grounded when a passenger, who had missed the flight and had made a hoax call to delay the flight. He was arrested from the airport later. "Making such calls is a non-bailable offence and attracts severe penalty," said Verma.