Assuring proactive measures are taken regarding the Delhi Airport canopy collapse incident, Union Civil Aviation Minister Ram Mohan Naidu Kinjarapu on Saturday said that a war room has been constituted to ensure refunds or alternate flights for affected passengers in the incident.
The Minister assured to take necessary proactive measures to ensure such incidents won’t occur in the future.
He also expressed his condolences on the loss of life in the canopy collapse incident at Delhi Airport Terminal 1.
Expressing his condolences, Ram Mohan Naidu said, “The incident that happened at the Delhi airport is very tragic and I offer my condolences to the one individual who lost his life. Some people were injured also in the incident, they have been taken to the hospital and their treatment is underway.”
He further said that the situation has been taken under control.
“We have taken control of the situation and as soon as the incident was reported, all the emergency response teams including teams of NDRF and CISF immediately went to the spot and engaged in the relief operations to prevent any further damage.”
The Minister guaranteed a refund within seven days or alternate flights for those whose flights were canceled.
Citing the proactive measures taken by the Civil Aviation Ministry, Naidu stated, “For now, Terminal-1 is completely closed and evacuated. All the flight movements have been shifted to Terminal 2 and Terminal 3. For those people whose flights have been canceled, they are being given either a refund or an alternate flight. The Civil Aviation Ministry has decided to pass a circular to provide refunds to the people within seven days.”
He further stated that a war room has been constituted in this regard and an officer from the Ministry has been placed in the war room to ensure the facilitation.
“To ensure this happens, we have set up war rooms at Terminal 2 and Terminal 3. The Ministry has released a statement regarding this which has all the numbers. We are taking care of it and have placed one of the officers in the war rooms,” he said.
The Ministry has also issued a circular to airlines, citing not to increase the fares.
“When such incidents occur, there is an increase in air fares, so we have issued another circular to airlines on not increasing the fare of the tickets and maintaining the prices,” said Naidu.
Ensuring such incidents don’t occur in the future, the Minister said, “We don’t want a similar incident to happen again so we have brought in a special team from IIT Delhi’s structural engineering department. They will give an initial inspection report. Based on this the necessary action will be taken to stop such incidents.”
“Since we don’t want such incidents to be repeated, we will ensure getting a structural preliminary inspection done at all airports. We have sought a report from all the airports across the country within 2-5 days, upon which we will see what necessary measures are needed to be taken to prevent such incidents in the future,” he further added.
Earlier, on Friday, the Delhi International Airport Limited (DIAL) said that a technical committee has been formed to investigate the cause of the incident.
In a statement on Friday, the DIAL said the technical committee will give the report as soon as possible.
“Due to heavy rains and winds through the night in Delhi, a canopy at the old departure forecourt of Terminal 1 (T1) partially collapsed around 5 am this morning.
While the cause for the collapse is being assessed, the primary cause seems to be the continued heavy rainfall over the past few hours,” the statement said.
The statement said that rescue operations were launched immediately by the Delhi Airport Emergency Response Team including Fire Fighting, Medical Team, and Operations, who provided all necessary support and assistance. Evacuation of passengers and all other individuals from T1 was the first priority and complete evacuation has been undertaken, it added.
DIAL is working with all relevant agencies, including the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA), Bureau of Civil Aviation (BCAS), Central Industrial Security Force (CISF), Delhi Police and the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) are jointly working to assess the situation and restore operations, the statement mentioned.
Four vehicles were damaged in the incident, the statement said, adding that the eight individuals who received minor injuries were provided immediate medical assistance at the Medanta Centre at Delhi Airport.
“The injured have been shifted to ESI Hospital and Indian Spinal Injury Centre (later they were referred to Safdarjung Hospital) for further medical supervision, as required. Unfortunately, one fatality was reported in the incident,” the statement said.
Following the incident, all flight operations from Terminal 1 have been suspended till further notice and rescheduled by the respective Airlines to operate from Terminal 2 and Terminal 3, till the impacted areas are restored for operations.
Further, Delhi Airport extended all support to the impacted individuals and the family of the deceased and announced a compensation of Rs 20 lakh to the family of the deceased, and Rs 3 lakh each to those who received minor injuries.