Passengers Eating On Mumbai Airport Tarmac Sparks Action: Indigo, MIAL Face Show Cause Notices

A viral video showing passengers eating meals on the tarmac at Mumbai Airport has triggered swift action from India's top aviation officials. In the early hours of Tuesday, following a midnight meeting chaired by Union Minister of Civil Aviation Jyotiraditya Scindia, the Bureau of Civil Aviation Security (BCAS) issued show cause notices to both IndiGo and Mumbai International Airport Limited (MIAL).

As per the notices, "both Indigo and MIAL were not proactive in anticipating the situation and making the appropriate facilitation arrangements for passengers at the airport." The aircraft was assigned a remote bay, C-33, instead of a Contact Stand-designated for walking passengers to and from an aircraft from an allocated boarding gate. This choice exacerbated passenger difficulties, denying them access to basic facilities such as restrooms and refreshments at the terminal.

The ground staff connected the stepladder to the aircraft, and passengers were instructed to disembark. Despite the airline having provisions of food packets in the coach (the bus designated to transport them to terminal 1 building), the passengers declined to board.

Expressing discontent over the unforeseen stopover, with many demanding an immediate departure to Delhi, passengers opted to gather their food packets and dine on the tarmac adjacent to the parked aircraft.

Airport authorities had to summon Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) personnel who cordoned off the area, as mentioned by an airline official.

Finally, the flight to Delhi took off at 2.39 am on Monday.

Both IndiGo and Air India flights experienced significant delays across most of their flights. An IndiGo flight, originally scheduled to land at 7.35 am, touched down at 9.33 am, while an Air India flight arrived at 11.08 am, nearly two hours past its scheduled landing time of 9.15 am, according to data from flightradar24.com, a live air traffic monitoring website.

Delays escalated after 1 pm. An IndiGo flight scheduled to arrive in Mumbai at 1.30 pm landed at 3.47 pm, delayed by two hours and 28 minutes. Another IndiGo flight, expected at 6.30 pm, experienced a delay of three hours and 20 minutes, landing at 9.47 pm, as indicated by the data.

On Monday evening peak hours, flightradar24.com reported an average flight delay of 70 minutes and a disruption index of 5 at Mumbai airport, reflecting delayed and cancelled flights. Out of the total arrivals on Monday, 217 flights or 45% were delayed, and 25 were cancelled. Meanwhile, for departures, 347 flights or 73% were delayed, with 36% being cancelled.