The Ministry of Civil Aviation on Friday sent a notice to Air India after a flight of the Tata Group-owned airline, which was to leave Delhi for San Francisco, faced a delay of nearly 20 hours.
The ministry has asked Air India to also explain why arrangements were not made to lessen the passengers’ misery, even as Delhi has been recording temperatures upwards of 50 degrees Celsius, NDTV reported.
“Operational reasons” led to the delay in flight’s departure from the national capital’s Indira Gandhi International Airport, sources in the former flag carrier said, adding that by the time these “issues” were resolved, flight duty time limitations had kicked in.
Originally scheduled to take off at 3:30 pm on Thursday, the service was initially rescheduled to 8 pm, and then to Friday afternoon. There were around 200 passengers onboard the Boeing 777 aircraft that was to operate flight AI 183.
At first, the aircraft was changed due to a “technical glitch” and the passengers were taken to another plane, on which the air conditioning system was not working. As a result, a few people even fainted.
“Senior citizens and children were feeling uneasy. With the AC system not working, passengers were agitated, and after almost one hour, they came out. This was after boarding the aircraft at 7:20 pm for the revised departure time of 8 pm,” one of the passengers told PTI.
“We had to wait for nearly an hour in the aerobridge before gates were opened for us to go back to the airport,” she claimed.
Meanwhile, social media platform X (previously Twitter) is flooded with posts from angry relatives seeking explanation from Air India over the delay, as well as discomfort caused to passengers.
