AI flight return: Crew waits for 10 hours at Delhi’s IGI
NEW DELHI: Air India’s Moscow-bound flight AI 1945 was cruising at 38,000 feet in Tashkent airspace on Saturday morning with five pilots and 12 cabin crew onboard when the cockpit got a one-line message to return to Delhi. This proved to be the start of an over 14-hour ordeal for the crew who did not know that the Airbus A320neo had been recalled because the pre-flight corona positive test report of a captain was mistakenly read as negative.
The crew informed Tashkent air traffic control that they needed to turn back. Coming back to India meant flying over Turkmenistan, Afghanistan and Pakistan and these countries as per protocol asked reason for returning. As per flight tracking websites, the aircraft took an orbit (loop) in Afghan airspace before entering Pakistan which means it was asked to hold for a while before getting the nod to re-enter Pakistan.
The aircraft landed at 12.50 pm in Delhi. “The plane parked at a regular use bay. All the 17 crew members remained inside the aircraft for 1.5 hours after which a team came to take a pilot (who was corona positive) away. Then the remaining 16 crew members waited for another half an hour inside the aerobridge,” said a crew member.
