Poor visibility continues to be a problem for flights coming to Chennai for the second day on Saturday.
Four different flights coming to Chennai from Muscat, Heathrow in London and Indira Gandhi International Airport in New Delhi were diverted to Rajiv Gandhi International Airport in Hyderabad.
The diverted flights include Air India, British Airways, IndiGo and Oman Air. One Air Austral flight from Réunion Island, France was diverted to Tiruchirappalli International Airport.
According to reports, ten other flights have been delayed due to visibility issues.
Tamil Nadu: Four flights diverted and ten delayed due to poor visibility at Chennai airport
— ANI (@ANI) January 4, 2020
Visibility at Chennai airport early in the morning was 50 metres.
On Friday, unexpected fog forced authorities to divert seven flights from the airport. The diverted flights included a Spice Jet flight from Hyderabad to Chennai, a Go Air flight from Mumbai to Chennai, Air India flights from Sharjah and Mumbai to Chennai, an Air Asia flight from Kuala Lumpur to Chennai, an Emirates flight from Dubai, and an Indigo flight from Pune.
According to low visibility procedure issued at Chennai airport, “An operator shall not conduct take-off with Runway Visibility Range (RVR)/Visibility less than standard Category I conditions of 550 meter RVR/800M Visibility unless low visibility procedures are enforced.”
TN weatherman Pradeep John explained the phenomenon adding that this fog was temporary unlike the smog in November. "Advection Fog to continue in Coastal and slightly interior TN for next 2-3 days. Its not smog like what happened in November. We can see once land gets heated up after sun comes up by 9 am, the fog fades away. In November, this did not happen and the smog remained throughout the day," he explained on his social media account. "Today was perfect fog and pollution is well under the limits," he added.