Agartala, Aug 24 (IANS) Five Guwahati-bound planes, including the flight carrying Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma, made emergency landings at the Maharaja Bir Bikram (MBB) Airport in Agartala due to bad weather in Guwahati on Sunday, officials said.

A senior MBB airport official said that five Guwahati-bound aircraft, including the flight carrying Assam Chief Minister, made emergency landings here on Sunday afternoon and evening. The flights – two from Dibrugarh, one each from Aizawl and Kolkata — after a few hours left MBB airport for Guwahati when the weather conditions improved. The Agartala-Guwahati flight went to Lokpriya Gopinath Bordoloi International Airport (LGBIA) on Sunday afternoon, but it could not land there and returned to Agartala and later left for its destination.

Tripura Tourism and Transport Minister Sushanta Chowdhury, West Tripura District Magistrate Vishal Kumar and other senior officials have rushed to the MBB airport after the Assam Chief Minister’s flight made an emergency landing at the airport.

Later, Chowdhury wrote on Facebook: “After getting information about the emergency landing of Assam’s honourable Chief Minister Shri Himanta Biswa Sarma ji’s Guwahati-bound aircraft at Agartala Airport due to bad weather in Guwahati, I rushed to the airport and spent some time with dada (elder brother).”

An official of the Airports Authority of India (AAI) said that the A320 aircraft, numbered ‘Flight IGO 187’, which was operating from Mohanbari airport of Dibrugarh in Assam and was scheduled to fly to Guwahati, was diverted to Agartala due to adverse weather conditions at Guwahati.

Currently, 13 to 16 flights operate from the MBB Airport every day with over 4,000 to 5,000 passenger footfalls daily. With a built-up area of 30,000 sq mt, the new terminal at the airport has been designed to handle both domestic and international passengers simultaneously during peak hours.

Agartala’s MBB Airport is the second busiest airport in the northeastern region after the Lokpriya Gopinath Bordoloi International (LGBI) Airport in Guwahati.

–IANS

sc/uk