Tricity battles fog woes amid train delays, cancelled flights

A heavy blanket of fog over North India hit life, especially commuters, affecting train schedules and putting flight operations on hold. Multiple trains were delayed for hours, leaving passengers stranded and frustrated.

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Among the worst affected were two Shatabdis from New Delhi. The morning one was rescheduled and reached Chandigarh 3 hrs 42 mins late. The train departs from New Delhi at 7.40 am and is scheduled to reach Chandigarh at 11.40 am. However, due to poor visibility, the train started 3 hrs 34 mins late from New Delhi. The evening Shatabdi, scheduled to arrive at Chandigarh at 8.38 pm, reached 1 hr 8 mins late.

Met predicts rain in city from today

After witnessing very dense fog for two days, the Meteorological Department has predicted partly cloudy sky with possibility of rain, along with thunderstorm, in the city on January 5 and 6. The city is likely to witness shallow fog tomorrow morning and rain in the afternoon. However, there will be mainly clear sky for next three days from January 7. According to the Met, a fresh western disturbance is likely to affect North-West India from January 10.

Even the Amb Andaura-bound Vande Bharat, which left New Delhi at 5.50 am, reached Chandigarh at 9.49 am, 1 hr 11 mins late. The 14217 Unchahar Express arrived from Prayagraj after an over 13-hour delay. Similarly, the 19307 Indore-Una Express, which was scheduled to arrive at 5 am, reached six hours late at 11 am.

“I had planned my entire day around the train’s arrival,” said GS Sandhu, a government official who arrived on the Shatabdi.

“I had meetings lined up, and now I’ve had to push everything back. This is frustrating because Shatabdi is supposed to be the premium service, it’s supposed to be punctual.”

With more fog expected in the coming days, travellers in Chandigarh are bracing up for further disruptions.

Fog disrupts flight schedule

Mohali: As many as 11 flights were cancelled and several delayed due to fog and poor visibility at the Shaheed Bhagat Singh International Airport Chandigarh today. The Delhi, Mumbai, Hyderabad, Bengaluru, Ahmedabad, Jaipur, Pune and several others had to be cancelled owing to various reasons.

The flight operations at the Shaheed Bhagat Singh International Airport Chandigarh were put on hold due to foggy weather and poor visibility today morning. As sky cleared out in the later part of the day, operations normalised.

Not a single flight took off or landed due to thick blanket of fog till 10 am today. The Abu Dhabi-Chandigarh flight was due to land here at 9am, but had to be diverted to Delhi. The first flight to take off at 10.49 am from here was to Delhi, which was more than three-and-a-half hours late. At 12.03 pm, the Jaipur flight touched down here, after which flight operations started normalising. Due to the disruption in flight schedule, most of the flights were behind the schedule today.

This is the second consecutive day when flight operations remained affected due to fog in the region.