Delhi-bound 145 passengers stranded at Surat airport

SURAT: Around 145 passengers bound to New Delhi were stranded on the Surat airport after Air India's (AI) Airbus-490 was grounded due to the engine failure late on Monday night.
The Airbus, which was scheduled to depart at 8 pm on Monday, was cancelled around 11:45 pm failure.
Sources said that the Airbus had arrived around 7:30 pm on Monday from Delhi. The passengers bound to Delhi had already boarded the aircraft.However, the pilot of the Airbus sensed trouble in the performance of the engine and immediately informed the ground staff.
Passengers were told that there was some technical snag and that they would have to wait inside the airport till further information on the departure. It was around 11:45 that the AI announced the cancellation.
This irked the passengers, who were waiting in the lounge for almost three hours. Many entered into heated arguments with the AI ground staff and took them to task for not giving proper information on the flight's status.
Sensing the trouble, the AI officials immediately arranged road travel for those passengers wanting to go to Ahmedabad and Mumbai to catch other flights to Delhi, while others were given hotel accommodation.
In the last seven months, around 10 such incidents have occurred where the AI has cancelled the flights due to technical reasons. In most of the cases, the flights have been delayed for more than three hours, leaving passengers in the lurch.
Frequent fliers have repeatedly urged the AI to replace its old aircrafts with the new ones.
President of the Surat Airport Action Committee (SAAC), Sanjay Ezhawa told TOI: "AI is operating old aircrafts on Surat-Delhi and Surat-Mumbai sectors. Every time there is some or the other problems with the AI aircrafts. Despite several representations, the AI is yet to replace its old aircrafts." Ezhawa added, "The AI has no technical support team at the Surat airport. Every time, there is a technical snag in the aircraft, a team of technicians arrive either from Mumbai or Delhi."
Airport sources said that the technical team arrived at the airport on Tuesday morning for repair of the aircraft.
Ezhawa said, "The AI is getting around 85 per cent occupancy in all its flights to and fro from Surat. The AI's ground staff do not care to respond to the passenger queries and make them sit at the airport for hours, without informing the correct status of the flights."
Abilash Mohanan, a frequent traveler from Surat said, "AI is knowingly using such old aircraft for Surat and if some major accident or mishap would occur due to their negligence or such technical failures, again every one will blame Surat airport for the accident."