IAF plane overshoots runway at Mumbai airport on Tuesday night; aircraft movement shut for main runway

Mumbai: An Indian Air Force (IAF) aircraft overshot the main runway while departing from the Mumbai airport on Tuesday night, an official said. “Due to the incident, aircraft movement was diverted to the secondary runway,” the official of the Mumbai International Airport Limited (MIAL) said on Wednesday. [caption id=“attachment_6007281” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] File image of Mumbai airport. PTI[/caption] “We confirm that an Air Force aircraft departing from the Mumbai airport had runway excursion at 11.39 pm on Tuesday,” the official said. A Defence spokesperson said the aircraft had abandoned take off in view of a technical issue and overshot the runway. “The aircraft and crew is safe. A recovery team has arrived in Mumbai and the aircraft will be cleared shortly,” the spokesperson added. The city-based Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport, the country’s second busiest airport after New Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International Airport, has two crossing — 09x27 (the main runway) and 14x32 (the secondary runway) which together handle a little over 1,000 arrivals and departures per day. A large part of the operations is carried out from the main runway.