Domestic flights resume from Ahmedabad, Surat airports

After a gap of two months, domestic flight operations resumed from Ahmedabad and Surat airports in Gujarat from Monday with new norms for passengers in view of the coronavirus outbreak, officials said.

Flight operations were suspended in the country in late March due to the coronavirus outbreak and the subsequent nationwide lockdown imposed to stem its spread. The Surat airport handled four flights on Monday, said its director Aman Saini. "Two flights arrived here from Delhi and Hyderabad and departed for the same destinations. Three flights were cancelled by a private operator on Monday," she said.

During the day, 40 flights were scheduled to arrive and an equal number slated to depart from the Ahmedabad airport said a senior official. However, the exact number of flights handled by the Ahmedabad airport was not available till the evening. Normally, the Ahmedabad airport handles around 200 domestic flights every day. These flights connect Ahmedabad with major Indian cities like New Delhi, Kolkata, Varanasi and Bengaluru.

The government had announced the suspension of passenger flights following the imposition of a nationwide lockdown on March 25. Last week, the civil aviation ministry had allowed resumption of domestic scheduled commercial passenger flights in a calibrated manner from May 25, subject to passengers following social distancing and other norms in view of the coronavirus outbreak.

(Representative Image)