Before the fog clears

The holiday season lost its warmth when people were stranded at airports across the world due to the fog disrupting flight schedules. The mist is beginning to clear now, but the loss in the last two weeks that the airlines had to bear, apart from passenger inconvenience has been phenomenal.
"This year, close to Rs 35 crore was returned to passengers due to flight cancellations," says Arpita Das, assistant manager, corporate communications of a private airline company.
Some others offered assistance on free rescheduling. Most airlines offered refreshments and a few provided hotel accommodation in case of a flight diversion. But passengers were not quite pleased.
The airport authorities' explanation is that fog is a natural phenomenon and air tickets carry a disclaimer mentioning that flights will be subject to delay and cancellation during the fog period.
Airlines have been constantly updating the training of their pilots. The number of CAT III-compliant pilots in India has gone up from 148 in 2005 to 326 in 2006 and the number of CAT II-trained pilots has risen from 661 in 2005 to 794 in December 2006.
08/01/07 Mona Ramavat/Times of India

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