Transport Ministry says grateful to MRIA

2 November 2015 10:42 pm

The Ministry of Transport and Civil Aviation yesterday said that SriLankan Airlines enjoyed fuel savings and payload gains by diverting its flight UL 230 to Mattala Rajapaksa International Airport (MRIA) instead of diverting it to Trivandrum, Chennai or Male due to heavy foggy conditions around the Bandaranaike International Airport (BIA).

UL 230 from Kuwait to BIA with 253 passengers and 14 crew members on board was diverted to the MRIA last morning.

The Transport Ministry said the passengers had also been thankful to the MRIA since they had the convenience of landing within the territory of Sri Lanka instead of landing in India or the Maldives.

“Previously, southern Indian airports and Male were the options for emergency landing – now the alternative has become the MRIA. This is the second incident where flights on their way to BIA were diverted to the MRIA due to bad weather conditions. Though the MRIA was criticized by some parties, these incidents are good examples that showed the benefits of the MRIA,” the ministry official said. (Piyumi Fonseka)