Heavy fog disrupted flight operations at the Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport (HSIA), resulting in a harrowing time for hundreds of fliers heading towards different destinations on Tuesday. Due to low visibility caused by dense fog that covered the airport, from midnight 3.30 am to 9.30 am Tuesday, scheduled flight operation was halted.
Within these six hours of time, five flights were diverted, HSIA air traffic officer SM Waheedur Rahman said. Airport information showed, a flight of Biman Bangladesh Airlines returning from Bangkok landed at Kolkata Airport, two flights of US-Bangla Airlines returning from Singapore and Doha landed at Kolkata, one landed at Myanmar that was returning from Guanzhou while another landed at Sylhet returning from Mascot.
Waheed said, “The fog remained till late Tuesday morning, disrupting flight operations and leaving several passengers stranded. A total of six flights had to be diverted from HSIA due to the poor visibility”. “Airport visibility reduced to 100 meters while normal visibility is 600 to 800 meters. Hence, the flight operations were delayed”, he added.
On the other hand, flight operations at Shah Amanat International Airport (SAIA) were also disrupted due to poor visibility caused by fog. Three scheduled flights of US-Bangla, Regent and Air Arabia landed at Kolkata. SAIA airport manager Wing Commander ABM Sarwar-E-Zaman confirmed this.
According to Bangladesh Meteorological Department, weather may remain dry in the next 24 hours. Mild cold wave is sweeping over Rajshahi and Rangpur divisions and the regions of Jashore and Kushtia, and it may continue, added the bulletin. However, night temperature may rise slightly and day temperature may remain nearly unchanged over the country.