Team Herald
VASCO: The move to close down Dabolim airport runway on Saturdays and Sundays by the naval authorities at INS Hansa has been strongly objected by the Travel and Tourism Authority of Goa (TTAG).
In a press statement, TTAG President Savio Messais said the Navy’s attempt to close down the runway, citing maintenance, should not be considered, as the same would have severe impact on the tourism industry, especially on chartered flights.
“There is a serious problem. The quality of runway has deteriorated and has become like PWD roads. Actually Navy constantly wants to do runway maintenance works and to do so they have to close down the runway and that is a major problem. How long do we have to hear about the closer of runway. Now they want to do it every Saturday and Sunday,” the TTAG president said.
We came to know about this just two weeks ago and have objected during the meeting. Now there is another meeting on April 30 to discuss the issue, he said, adding the Navy uses the runway from Monday to Friday, and from Saturday to Sunday the whole day was open for civilian flights. He said most of the charters land on Saturdays and Sundays and the new request by the Navy would force several regular charter flights to Goa to change its routine and added that currently getting new slots for landing on other days would be difficult.
The TTAG president said if they closed the runway on Saturdays and Sundays it would mean that all seven days the runway would be closed from 8.30 am to 12.30 am and this would have a severe impact on charters and domestic flights.
“The maintenance work seems to increasing and there must be some reason for this. Either the runway is being overloaded or the quality of works is substandard, which may have to be looked into,” Messais alleged.
