Pune airport authorities propose 3 remote bays for grounded aircraft to create room for regular flights

The authorities at Pune airport have sent a letter to AAI headquarter requesting additional space for parking of aircraft as ‘remote bay’ at Lohegaon Pune Airport.

Pune Airport has10 parking slots in its existing parking bay. However, since faulty aircraft are parked here, other passenger planes have to wait for parking availability, thus delaying flights.

With grounded aircraft parked for seven to eight days and sometimes even a month, other passenger planes cannot use the parking bays for flight operations. As a result, there is a long queue of aircraft waiting to be parked to disembark and reembark passengers. At times, flights are given ‘go around’ instructions and they hover over the airport till they receive instructions to land.

Often, passengers are not allowed to exit the plane after landing at the airport. On May 16, an Air India (AI) flight from Pune to Delhi collided with a ground vehicle, and the aircraft was kept in parking bay number 1 for one-and-a-half months.

Hence, the authorities at Pune airport have proposed separate remote bays for parking such aircraft which have been grounded for various reasons so that they do not occupy premium bays near the gates, which can be used for scheduled flights. Remote bays are already available in many airports across the country such as Mumbai, Delhi and Chennai. Although Pune Airport is one of the 10 major airports in the country, this facility is not available here which is affecting passengers.

Santosh Dhoke, Pune Airport director, said, “Considering the number of parking bays, three ‘remote bays’ are proposed. However, additional space is required for that and the work of getting that space is underway. A remote bay will be provided at the Pune Airport location as space becomes available.”

With this initiative, more parking bays will be freed up for regular passenger operations, bringing more efficiency in the scheduling of flights. Pune airport being a military airport, is already operating under multiple constraints of runway availability and space for commercial flight operations.