Late-winter smog disrupts traffic in north India

Yet another dense winter smog enveloped Delhi and its surrounding areas as the mercury dipped on Thursday night, disrupting air, rail and road traffic this morning.

Operations of more than 50 flights were affected at the Indira Gandhi International Airport due to low visibility.

The fog was so dense over the airport that visibility dropped to below 50 metres on both the runways at the IGI.

Though no flights were cancelled, the schedules were badly disrupted as no flight could take off from 6:00 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 started to deteriorate from 1:00 am, forcing the airport authorities to implement low-visibility procedures. This procedure was implemented on the main runway at 4.10 am; but to little effect until the fog cleared later in the morning.

Several trains bound to and from Delhi were also running hours late, to the discomfiture of passengers on the poorly catered and narrow-seated Indian Railways.