Civil Aviation Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia has informed that Code 4C operation is not feasible at the Rourkela airport within the available land.
Scindia made the statement in Rajya Sabha while giving a reply to a question of BJD member Amar Patnaik, who, a few days ago, had also written a letter to the Minister demanding a 4C licence to the Rourkela airport.
The Rourkela airport is owned and operated by the Steel Authority of India Ltd (SAIL) as per an MoU signed with the Airports Authority of India (AAI). Currently, the airport is licensed for Aerodrome Reference 2B operations (suitable for 20-seater type of aircraft), Scindia said.
The SAIL, Rourkela has accorded permission to use 146 acres of land for development of the airport to Code 3C Instrument Flight Rules (IFR) category. The Rourkela airport was identified for operations of RCS flights connecting Rourkela with Kolkata and Bhubaneswar in the first round of bidding under UDAN. Later, these routes were cancelled due to non-compliance of the Agreement by the Selected Airline Operator (SAO).
Subsequently, in December, 2018, the AAI received a bid in the third round of UDAN bidding for the Bhubaneswar-Rourkela-Bhubaneswar route with ATR72 type aircraft.
The SAOs under UDAN are obligated to commence RCS flight operations on a RCS route within a period of six months from the issuance of Letter of Award or within two months from the readiness of airport, whichever is later, unless any extension is granted by the Implementing Agency.
At present, 1,349 feet of existing serviceable runway is not discarded at the Rourkela airport for ATR 72 type of aircraft operations under Visual Flight Rules (VFR) conditions, Scindia