DHAKA: Blanket of thick fog disrupted the operations at Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport, delaying the landings and taking off of scheduled flights of Turkish Airlines, Kuwait Airways and Biman Bangladesh Airlines.

No planes have been taking off or landing at the airport from 11:00pm to 8:00am for several days. Planes have been landing at Kolkata instead of Dhaka. Flights are either leaving from or coming to Dhaka some 2-3 hours after the scheduled time.

Airport sources said as the fog surrounded the airport, forcing a flight of Turkish Airlines to leave Istanbul for Dhaka after five hours delay. Now the airline’s morning flight lands at 10:00am everyday.

Since then, no other airlines operated their fights on time in the morning amid thick fog.

On Tuesday, the fog caused delay for a Kuwait Airways flight which was scheduled to land at 4:55am, a Biman Bangladesh flight from Kuala Lumpur at 5:00am, other Biman fights from Doha and Dubai at 7:45am and 8:00am respectively. A fight of Regent Airways from Kuala Lumpur was scheduled to land at 8:20am instead of the scheduled time.

Sources of the Airport fight operation office said no flight landed on the scheduled time and a flight of Kuwait Airways has already missed the morning schedule.

As planes land on delay, it also takes off on delay. Thick fog causes problems to flight schedules during this time every year and this happened this year too, the sources added.

BDST: 0947 HRS, DEC 09, 2014