In a major development, flight services at Amritsar Airport on Monday night were disrupted for almost 3 hours due to the spotting of drones into the airspace. This happened for the first time in Punjab when flight services were halted for almost 3 hours at Sri Guru Ramdas International Airport. According to the Airport Authority, there was drone movement from 10.15 pm to 11 pm. During this time, drones were sometimes seen and sometimes disappeared. Flights could be resumed after 1 am late night.
During this time, the Air India flight from Delhi returned after staying in the air for 20 minutes. After this, this flight landed at Amritsar airport at 4 am on Tuesday. Furthermore, reports suggest that Indigo's Pune, Indigo's Delhi, Air Asia, and Batik Air's Kuala Lumpur flights were delayed. As per the information received, 3 drones were seen flying. Out of these, two drones were seen near the boundary of Rajasansi side airport and on the backside of the terminal. When Air Traffic Control (ATC) gave further information, the movement of flights was halted for security reasons.
The remaining flights departed only after 1 am late at night. Police and agencies searched inside and outside the airport at night. Search operations were also conducted twice on Tuesday morning. No drone was recovered during the search operation.
It is said that drones might have been flown due to Janmashtami. However, airport authorities or police officers are mum over the matter. Notably, no one is allowed to fly a drone within 4 kilometers of the airport, but this has been seen for the first time in Amritsar. Police have not received any complaint from anyone. It has also been found out that jammers are also installed at the airport, due to these jammers, no remote of any kind can work.