Bhubaneswar/Mumbai: Budget carrier IndiGo has cancelled as many as 47 flights from several cities including Bhubaneswar on Tuesday after the country’s aviation regulator Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) grounded its eight A320Neo planes with faulty Pratt & Whitney engines, along with three such aircraft of GoAir.
Apart from Bhubaneswar, flights have also been cancelled from Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Kolkata, Hyderabad, Bangalore, Patna, Srinagar, Amritsar, Srinagar and Guwahati, among others.
Confirming the development, Bhubaneswar Airport Director Suresh Chandra Hota said "Only one IndiGo flight-No 701 has been grounded in Bhubaneswar."
This was a planned cancellation so the carrier has informed that alternative arrangements were made for passengers who had booked their tickets," he said.
The DGCA's decision comes after a Lucknow bound IndiGo flight returned to Ahmedabad within 40 minutes of its getting airborne due to a mid-air engine failure on Monday.
Citing safety of aircraft operations, the director of the DGCA, in its 12 March order, said that A320Neos fitted with PW1100 engines beyond ESN 450 have been grounded with immediate effect.
Three other IndiGo A320Neo planes have been on the ground since February following similar engine failures.
The cancellation of flights has hit air travellers as hundreds of passengers were stranded across the country.
Similarly, the DGCA has also directed GoAir to ground its 18 planes over eight cities.
IndiGo which carries about 40% of domestic flyers operates about 1,000 flights daily while GoAir which has a market share of around 10%, operates 230 flights per day sources said.