Photos: Dense fog engulfs Delhi; air, rail traffic hit

Flight operations came to a standstill at the Indira Gandhi International Airport in New Delhi on Friday due to dense fog, which reduced visibility to below 50 metres and affected the schedule of over 50 flights.

The fog descended upon the airport last night and it become so dense this morning that the runway visibility dropped to below 50 metres on both the runways rendering them inoperational, an airport official said.

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Two Jet Airways flights, one from Abu Dhabi and other from Dammam and a Lufthansa flight from Munich were diverted between 5.30 am and 7.30 am.

According to sources, the pilots were trained to operate flights using CATIII B instrument landing system, which helps pilot to land a plane when runway visibility is up to 50 metres.

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Though there were no cancellation of flights, the schedule of over 50 flights was disrupted as no flight could take off from 6 AM due to runway visibility dropping to less 125 metres, the required minimum parameter for an aircraft to take off in low visibility conditions.

The visibility at the third runway (29/11) started to deteriorate from 1 am, forcing the airport authorities to implement low visibility procedures.

The LVP was implemented on main runway at 4.10 am. There were traffic snarls along key routes in the capital. There was thick fog in south Delhi as well and on the toll road connecting the Capital to Noida.

Visibility was almost zero in stretches on the Outer Ring Road.Train services were also affected.

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