With the air quality improving in Delhi, the city received a positive rating by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), United States (US) for its timely flight operations on Monday.
The FAA has given it a “very low” status on the Flight Delay Index at the Indira Gandhi International Airport (IGI) among the other Asian airports. It indicated that the clean air quality will cause good visibility to help generate smooth flight operations. Air quality plays a very decisive role in flight operations and it becomes more significant in a place like Delhi which has been rated as the most polluted city in the world.
However, Delhi’s air quality record has improved in last week with low concentrations of both primary and secondary pollutants. According to the real time ambient air data of US embassy and SAFAR, Ministry of Earth Sciences (MoES), a noteworthy fall in pollutant values has been measured.
In the air quality forecast index of US embassy, the air quality status is “moderate” which has good impact on the visibility factor of flights.
According to aviation experts clean air has better visibility than polluted air which contains dust and other particulate matter hampering the flight operations. “A number of factors influence visibility, instance: precipitation, fog or mist, haze, smoke and in coastal areas sea spray under the right conditions,” said an aviation expert.
As per the flight delay index of FAA, the IGI has recorded “very low” delays in its flight operation where visibility factor was two miles. On the list of the index, Capital International airport in Beijing, airports in Jakarta, Singapore and Tokyo have recorded “moderate” delays. Commenting on the air pollution scenario, environmentalist Gopal Krishna said activities from industrial districts and fires in residential areas add soot and carbon to the environment reducing visibility even more. “This adds enough condensation nuclei to the air so that condensation will take place before reaching a Relative Humidity of 100% and thus smog is formed,” said Krishna.