Fog grounds Chandigarh airport

Fog grounds Chandigarh airportChandigarh, Jan 5 - The Chandigarh airport has been virtually shut for three days and no flight has landed or taken off due to dense fog, officials said Tuesday.

"We had to cancel all the flights because of very poor visibility. We are keeping our fingers crossed and waiting for these clouds to clear," said a Chandigarh airport official.

The airport's Instrument Landing System (ILS), essential during these days of low visibility, has been lying defunct for some months.

Air India, Jet Airways, Go Air, Kingfisher and MDLR are the major airlines operating from Chandigarh. The flights service New Delhi, Mumbai, Jammu and Srinagar.

Chandigarh is considered the gateway to Punjab, Haryana and Himachal Pradesh. Its airport gets about 15 flights a day.

The situation is similar at the Rajasansi international airport in Amritsar city, about 250 km from here, which has not received any flights from New Delhi and Mumbai for the last two days. (IANS)