IGI Airport's Terminal 2 to Shut from May 17

May 12—The Delhi airport's Terminal 2, or T2, will be shut for flight operations from May 18 in the wake of falling passenger footfall and fewer flights due to the ongoing second national wave of the Covid-19 pandemic, officials aware of the development said on Tuesday.

All flight operations will now shift to Terminal 3 (T3), which will remain the only operational terminal at Delhi's airport, the officials said.

The recent suspension of international flights between India and some countries has also led to a fall in the number of passengers at the airport, forcing the authorities to take the decision, the officials added.

After last year's lockdown, when the Indira Gandhi International airport resumed operations after two months of complete closure between March 25 and May 25, passenger footfall at the airport gradually began rising, and went up to more than 100,000 per day by the end of March 2021. Before the pandemic broke out, the average footfall was 150,000, officials said.

"However, as cases of coronavirus rapidly rose in the country, a drastic fall in passenger footfall was noticed. Some countries have also suspended international flights to India, leading to an overall drop in the number of passengers by 65% to 70%. In the past one week, the passenger footfall has been as low as 32,000 to 35,000 per day," said a senior airport official who asked not to be named.

The officer said T2 will be closed starting midnight on May 17.

"All the flights scheduled from T2 beyond May 18 will be shifted to T3. The airlines have been informed to alert flyers," the officer said.

An official from the Delhi air traffic control (ATC) said the air traffic movements (ATM) in the country recovered to almost 1,000 per day since last year from being as low as 300.

"Recently, there has been a fall in the number of flights. The daily ATM has once again slipped to approximately 250-300 flights a day. Before Covid-19 struck, the daily ATM was around 1,300. With such low ATMs, T3 should be sufficient to handle the operations," the officer said.

After the two months of a complete ban on air traffic in India last year, while Terminal 3 started functioning May 25 onwards, Terminal 2 resumed operations on October 1.

Terminal 1 has remained shut since March 25 due to expansion work.

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