New Delhi: An Air India airplane sure to Newark (USA) on Thursday returned to land again in Delhi round half-hour after takeoff as a useless bat was discovered contained in the jetliner’s enterprise class cabin.
The pilot contacted the Air Traffic Control (ATC) after being attentive to the issue and safely landed again on the Delhi Airport at round 3.55 a.m.
Full disinfection was performed after touchdown of the flight, which was declared Aircraft on Grounded, and all of the passengers had been shifted to a different airplane.
The airport wildlife workers was later requested to catch the bat, which turned out to be useless.
Air India has ordered an investigation in opposition to the engineering staff with regard to the incident.
“The probable reason may be loading vehicles like those for catering because all the time rats/ bats came from their vehicles only,” ANI quoted an Air India official as saying.
A senior Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) official whereas commenting on the incident mentioned “Air India B777-300ER aircraft VT-ALM operating Flight AI-105 (Delhi-Newark) was involved in air-turn-back due to bat reported in the cabin by the crew after departure”.
“Fuel was jettisoned and the aircraft landed safely at Delhi. After landing fumigation was carried out and a dead bat carcass was retrieved from seat 8DEF area,” he added.
