The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) recently gave a green flag to the Vijayawada Airport for utilising its expanded runway for landing and taking-off of flights. The Vijayawada International Airport located in Gannavaram will now be able to use the expanded runway for operating flights which was completed after undergoing construction for 24 months. However, the flight take-off and landing won’t start right away at the concerned runway. As per a report from The New Indian Express, DGCA has said that proper flight trials and all the parameters set should be first met by the expanded runway. More details on the story ahead.
Vijayawada Airport Expanded Runway Can Start Once all the Parameters are Met
The expanded runway in the Vijayawada Airport is soon going to start once all the parameters set by the DGCA are met, and flights trials are conducted. Director of the airport, G Madhusudana Rao confirmed the same and said that the flight trials are going to be conducted in the extended runway in the last week of November this year.
He further noted that once the permission is granted, big aircraft such as Boeing 747-400 and 777-300 can also land and take-off at the airport. Apart from that, the terminal can accommodate 16 aircraft.
For the unaware, the Airports Authority of India (AAI) started to expand the runway back in February 2017. It took two years for the work to complete which included re-carpeting and strengthening of the 2,286-metre-long runway and then further extending it by 1,074 metres. After the extension, the total length of the runway has now become 3,360 metres while the width is the same 45 metres.
The estimated cost for all the work came about Rs 160 crores. The work on the expanded runway could have been finished a lot sooner. The expansion plan was proposed way back in 2009, but several problems arose when it came to acquiring land for the same. However, the state government was successful in acquiring about 700 acres of land for the expansion and the foundation for expanding the runway was laid in 2017.
