Come March 30, three more flights from Gaggal airport
Three more flights will be added to the Gaggal airport from March 30. According to official sources, these flights will operate between Gaggal and Jaipur, Gaggal and Noida and Gaggal and Dehradun.
The schedule for the operation and timings of these flights will be finalised soon. At present Air India, Indigo and SpiceJet are operating six flights between Gaggal and Delhi, Gaggal and Chandigarh and Gaggal and Shimla.
Gaggal airport is the busiest airport of Himachal Pradesh. At present, the strip is 1,372 m and can only accommodate small 70-seater planes. As only small planes can land here, the airfare is among the highest in the country. It costs as high as Rs 21,000 for a one-way trip from Dharamsala to Delhi in the peak tourist season. It is expected that with the addition of new flights in this circuit, the air fare will likely come down.
The Gaggal airport is spread over 1,269 acres at an altitude of 2,492 feet. Its 300 by 200-foot apron provides parking space for two turboprop aircraft like the ATR-72, while its terminal building can handle 100 passengers at a time. This is the only airport in the state where an 85-seater aircraft can land easily.
Earlier in a proposed draft plan for the expansion of the airport, the Airports Authority of India (AAI) had decided to increase the runway length from 1,376m to 3,110m for the easy landing of bigger aircraft like airbuses and Boeings to boost the tourism industry of the state.
The state government had already given its approval for the expansion of the airport. The land acquisition process had also been started. The state government had already disbursed over Rs 300 crore compensation to the affected persons.
The two other airports in Kullu and Shimla have no regular air traffic because of small airstrips and other technical reasons. Besides, there is no scope of expansion of the airstrips at these two stations.
