LUCKNOW: Two flights, one coming from New Delhi and other from Kolkata had to be diverted to New Delhi due to poor visibility and lack of CAT III instrument landing system on the eastern stretch of the runway at Amausi airport on Sunday morning.The flight from Kolkata was scheduled to arrive at 5.40am, while the Delhi-Lucknow-Hyderabad flight was to land at 5.50 am. Just as the two aircraft approached the run way, the pilot of Kolkata-Lucknow flight alerted the air traffic controller of low visibility conditions. The pilot informed the ATC that he was taking the flight to Delhi. The conversation was overheard on wireless network by the pilot of other approaching flight (Delhi-Lucknow-Hyderabad) who too decided to return to Delhi. Confirming this, officer on special duty, AAI, Sanjay Narain said: “The pilots of the two flights did not land because of low visibility. Both flights had to land from the eastern side.”Narain said: “'The CAT III ILS is installed on western side of runway as majority of flights land from that side. The number of flights landing from eastern side (Kanpur highway) is very less, hence CAT III system was installed on western side (Omaxe city side). There is no CAT III on the eastern side of runway.”Passengers were not willing to buy the reason as Amausi airport is CAT III enabled where aircraft can land even in heavy fog during peak winters.Passengers waiting for the flights were later put on other flights. “At 5.30am it was announced that the flight from Kolkata was about to land but after 10 minutes they said it was late by 3 hours. Next, they announced that the flight to Hyderabad was also late by 3 hours,” said a passenger.

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