The Pantnagar Airport in Udham Singh Nagar district will start operation of night flights, officials of the Airport Authority of India said here on Thursday.
Officials said preparations are underway for night flight operation initially with six-seater aircrafts as trials. After successful completion of the night time flight trials, a private commercial airline is expected to start regular night time flights of 24-seater aircraft from the Pantnagar Airport from the last week of September.
Pantnagar Civil Aviation Director, SK Singh, informed that a private commercial airline had shown interest in the operation of Delhi-Pantnagar-Dehradun flight. With the introduction of this service, the people would have the choice of taking night time flight from Pantnagar airport. This flight would also travel to ludhiana in Punjab and Shimla in Himachal Pradesh.
Singh further informed that in order to provide a fillip to tourism and adventure tourism in the State, a project amounting to Rs 600 crore has been prepared for expansion of the Pantnagar airport. land will be acquired soon from the Forest Department, the Uttarakhand Seeds and Terai Development Corporation (USTDC), Pantnagar University, Railways and the Sainik Farm at Pattharchatta with an aim to develop the airport adequately to facilitate the operation of passenger jet aircrafts from Pantnagar airport by 2020.
The official went on to state that there had been a considerable rise in the number of airline passengers from the Udham Singh Nagar and Nainital districts. A 48-seater aircraft is being used for regular flights between Pantnagar and Delhi. This flight service has been eliciting good response due to which at times 72-seater aircrafts are also used for the service.
Apart from these passenger flights, the four and eight seater aircrafts chartered by industrialists travelling to and from SIIDCUl also arrive at this airport about 10 times in a month.
Singh said in order to develop the Pantnagar Airport to an international standard on 571 acre land area, apart from extension of the runway, an instrument landing system, radar, two layer building, four aero bridges, 12 parking slots, four escalators and other features will be facilitated here.
Facility will also be developed for cargo and hangers to enable transport of fruits, vegetables and flowers from here. After the development of the new airport, the present airport will be converted into the Haj terminal, added Singh.
He informed that in line with the intentions of the Central Government, efforts are also underway to facilitate and develop air services in the mountainous regions. As part of this, attempts are also being made to facilitate helicopter services to Pithoragarh.
A helicopter service provider has also shown interest in this possibility. Other modes of flight including powered hang-gliders will also be encouraged in the mountainous regions from this airport in the future, he added.