Flights at Delhi Airport Normalize Following ATC System Failure

Post by : Mina Rahman

Employing a steady recovery, flight operations at Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International Airport, one of India’s busiest hubs, are slowly returning to normalcy, nearly 36 hours post a significant technical failure which impacted the Air Traffic Control (ATC) system.

Flight tracking website Flightradar24 reports that on Saturday, approximately 129 flights faced delays (53 arrivals and 76 departures), marking a notable improvement from the nearly 800 delays observed on Friday. Currently, the average delay is about five minutes for arrivals and 19 minutes for departures.

The Delhi Airport authorities released a statement confirming that the issue concerning the Automatic Message Switching System (AMSS)—crucial for the ATC flight planning mechanism—is stabilizing.

“Operations at Delhi Airport are moving back to normal, and all relevant teams are working hard to alleviate the inconveniences caused. Passengers should maintain communication with their airlines for up-to-date flight information,” stated the airport this morning.

Airline Recovery Initiatives Underway

IndiGo Airlines, predominantly affected by this outage, informed that flight operations are “progressively being reinstated.”

“The temporary malfunction of the AMSS affecting Air Traffic Control has now been rectified, and normal operations are on the mend at Delhi Airport and other northern airports that experienced impacts. While flight operations are getting back on track, some delays and terminal congestion may persist for a while,” IndiGo shared in a statement.

The airline emphasized that stabilization is expected within the upcoming hours and advised passengers to verify real-time updates prior to heading out.

Passenger Chaos and Discontent

This technical glitch led to turmoil at Delhi Airport, commencing Thursday evening with over 500 flight delays, which escalated to nearly 800 on Friday.

Averages for departure delays ranged between 45 minutes and one hour, with several arrivals significantly affected due to restricted parking and congested airspace.

Numerous travelers found themselves stranded within terminals, waiting for extended periods while departure boards continually indicated delays. Some individuals reported being kept aboard aircraft for lengthy durations prior to take-off.

AAI: Flight Safety Remained Ensured

Insiders indicated that the issue arose when ATC officers identified missing flight plan data on their screens, traced back to a malfunction within the AMSS, which impaired the automatic message stream. Consequently, controllers had to manually handle flight plans as the system ceased transmitting data to the auto track network.

The Airports Authority of India (AAI) clarified that, despite the extensive disruption, flight safety was never compromised.

“Aircraft already airborne faced no impact. The disruption was strictly related to processing pre-departure messages and flight plans,” the AAI stated.