The national capital’s second airport, Noida International Airport, is expected to complete calibration and validation flights to verify aircraft’s arrival and departure procedures by December this year, its CEO Christoph Schnellmann said on Thursday.
The airport plans to apply for an aerodrome license in December once the aforementioned flights are successfully completed.
The airport is expected to start flight operations in April 2025, instead of the earlier timeline of December 2024, following delays due to supply-chain disruptions affecting its construction.
A calibration flight for a new airport verifies and fine-tunes navigation aids, runway lighting, and airspace, ensuring safety and accuracy before commercial operations commence.
A validation flight is a test flight conducted to ensure that an aircraft, crew, or procedure meets safety and regulatory standards before official operations.
Kiran Jain, Chief Operating Officer, Noida International Airport explained that the airport’s runway has been constructed and the next step would be to install lights on it. Nearly 1,50,000 square metres of area around the runway is also being landscaped.
In its first phase of development, the airport will have one runway and one passenger building with a capacity to handle 1.2 crore passengers per annum.
The multi-modal cargo terminal at the airport is expected to be built by December. Its initial capacity will be 2,00,000 tonnes per year, which will be later increased to 2 million tonnes per year.
(With inputs from PTI)