Mumbai-Bound Flight Grounded at Bhubaneswar Due to Technical Snag

A Mumbai-bound flight was grounded shortly before take-off after it developed a technical snag at the Biju Patnaik International Airport (BPIA) here on Sunday afternoon.

There were 111 passengers and five crew members on-board the Air India flight AI 670, whose pilot detected a major fault and communicated it to the Air Traffic Control (ATC) at BPIA.

Few minutes later, the pilot decided not to go ahead with the flight. "All person on-board are safe. The aircraft was immediately taken off the runway and shifted to the hanger for maintenance," said Station Manager, Air India, TK Ray. While Air India officials did not divulge details about the snag, an engineering team was pressed into action immediately.

There was displeasure among as passengers over termination of the flight which was already late by two hours and scheduled to depart at 3.10 pm instead of its regular departure time at 1:10 p.m.

"We had already boarded the flight and it was about to approach the runway when it was stopped," a passenger said. Some passengers were arranged to be flown to Delhi from where they will travel to Mumbai.

Other passengers would take the flight to Mumbai tomorrow morning. Air India has arranged travel and stay for the stranded passengers in a City hotel, Ray said.