Progress on Delhi airport runway upgrade slow, despite closure: Officials

The nearly month-long closure of runway 28/10 at Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International Airport (IGIA) did not result in significant progress, officials close to the development said, adding that the runway is expected to be available by May 8.

While the Airports Authority of India (AAI), which is responsible for installing the instrument landing system (ILS), will continue to work on their side of the process, officials said that the airport operator in charge of the runway lighting system could barely begin the work and will only resume the same during the next shutdown, in mid-June.

Delhi airport authorities shut runway 28/10 on April 8 to upgrade its ILS to CAT III B standards, an enhancement aimed at enabling operations in low-visibility conditions, which is common during winter mornings and nights, when fog is heaviest. However, by April 11, the airport started experiencing major flight delays, pointing to poor planning among the stakeholders and easterly winds that provided unfavourable meteorological conditions for flight operations, which prompted civil aviation minister Ram Mohan Naidu to call an urgent meeting with the stakeholders and take the decision to pause the runway work.

“The AAI began work towards installing ILS on the runway and will continue to do so,” an AAI official said.

The official, who did not wish to be named, said, “The ILS consists of two parts: a localiser and a glideslope or glide path. Work for the localiser is being conducted in the localiser hut (a small structure that houses the localiser transmitter) which is placed outside the runway safety area away. The glideslope is an antenna (that transmits ultra-high frequency radio signals to the aircraft), placed around 1,000 feet away from the touchdown zone (known as threshold area in aviation). Both these equipment placed on two sides of a runway do not interfere or cause any inconvenience with the flight movements,” the official said.

An official in the know of the matter, however, said that work towards extending the runway lighting system had just begun. “The pipes and channels for installing the lighting system were being laid when the decision to stop the work was taken. It was then paused and work towards restoring operations from the runway has been in process since then,” he said.

A second official said, “The airport operator is expected to wrap up and apply for the inspection of the runway to the DGCA (Directorate General of Civil Aviation) by Monday evening.”

As per the standard operating procedure, aviation regulator DGCA conducts a detailed inspection of the runway and issues clearance to begin regular flight operations. “But the DGCA has to be notified about the completion of restoration work by the airport operator, which is expected on Monday,” the second official said.

A ministry official, requesting anonymity, said, “The DGCA inspection may take a couple of days, after which the runway may be operational from May 8. It will shut again on June 15 to resume work and is expected to be fully operational by September 15.”

Delhi Airport has four runways. The newest became operational in 2023. Terminal 2 was closed on April 15, with its traffic — about 46,000 passengers and 270,280 flights annually — shifted to the expanded Terminal 1.

The Delhi International Airport Ltd (DIAL), which manages the airport, announced on April 20 the decision to temporarily suspend the critical ILS upgrade work. “Runway 10/28 will be brought back into operation in the first week of May, with the remaining upgrade activities deferred for a month or so,” it posted on X.