The Impacts of Low Visibility on the Aviation Services of Patna Airport During the Period from 2016 to 2023

Abstract

Airport efficiency depends on fast reactions to circum-stances. Local weather conditions may have an impact on airport operations, which may affect the network. Local weather events and airport operations may affect the network. Low visibility due to fog, thunderstorms, rain, etc. affects Patna Airport, India's 15th busiest airport. It is one of the Airports Authority of India's lucrative airports, located in the Indo-Gangetic Plain (IGP), where fog reduces vision and interrupts traffic often in the post-monsoon and winter seasons. Because there is just one operating runway (07/25) at Jay Prakash Narayan International (JPNI) Airport, Patna, and around one hundred daily flight operations, any downtime might have a substantial monetary impact on the aviation services. Therefore, it is absolutely necessary to carry out a quantitative study of the losses that are anticipated. This was the first study of its kind that looked at the impact of low visibility (due to fog and a thunderstorm) on economic losses at Patna Airport. This research also investigates the impacts that fog has on aviation services, in addition to its frequency, duration, and characteristics that are linked. Over Patna Airport, there were a total of 726 in-stances of fog (visibility<1000m) and 171 instances of dense fog (visibility<200m) during the studied period, i.e., April 2016 and March 2023 (7 years). As a result, the tacti-cal level of analysis that this approach offers enables the stakeholders to enhance the services and better mitigate the impacts of local weather on the effective operation of the airports.