New Delhi-bound passengers stranded at Bangalore airport for 18 hours

More than 150 passengers, including children, on board a New-Delhi bound private airliner, were stranded at the Bangalore airport for more than eighteen hours since Thursday night.

The Bangalore-New Delhi Go Air flight was scheduled to leave for New Delhi at 9.30 pm on Thursday night, but the departure was put off by two hours initially due to “technical problems”. Little did the passengers realize that their ordeal had just begun.

After yet another postponement in the departure schedule, the aircraft finally took off at 12.30 am. After being airborne for about an hour, the passengers were informed about poor visibility at the airport in New Delhi and the aircraft soon returned to Bangalore.

After returning the Bangalore, the flight crew including the pilots disembarked the aircraft and “just disappeared”, the harried passengers complained. “We were provided with no information whatsoever. We were left to fend for ourselves”, a passenger told reporters.

Several passengers, who were travelling with their kids, had to take help themselves with the food kept in the stores of the aircraft to feed the hungry children. “We had a harrowing time”, said the passengers, who were literally on the runway till Friday morning.

The passengers later approached the Bangalore airport officials and brought to their notice the plight of the passengers of the private airliner.

Airport officials said the passengers were later accommodated in a different aircraft. “They were issued with boarding passes at 1.30 pm and the flight took off at 3.30 pm”, airport officials said.

But, the eighteen-hour wait at the Bangalore airport had taken a heavy toll on the passengers, many of whom were livid with anger. But, officials of Go Air, the private airliner scheduled to ferry the passengers, remained tight-lipped over the long delay the reasons behind keeping the passengers grounded.