New ATC tower at CSIA to be ready by year-end

Work on the new air traffic control tower at the Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport,now standing over 50 metres tall near the entry to the domestic terminal,has crossed the halfway mark.

Work on the new air traffic control (ATC) tower at the Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport,now standing over 50 metres tall near the entry to the domestic terminal,has crossed the halfway mark. Airport operator Mumbai International Airport Limited (MIAL) expects to complete construction of the 83-metre tower by the year-end,though ATC officers will be able to start operations only by June next year,said officials.

Around 53 metres of the tower has been constructed. The rest of it will be completed by the end of this year. New equipment is being purchased for the tower and it will be ready for operation by June 2012. For around three to four months,both towers will be in use, said a spokesperson for MIAL.

This location is considered far safer for flights as compared to the location of the 60-metre-tall old tower at the other end of the airport from where the ATC now operates.

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Some foreign airlines such as Singapore Airlines,Cathay Pacific,Continental Airlines and Qatar Airways do not use the secondary runway because the old ATC tower is within 150 metres of the secondary runway and is in the funnel zone for flights.

For MIAL,the old tower is in the way of the parallel taxiway for the secondary runway. Half of the full-length taxi track for secondary runway 14-32 has now been constructed and it will be completed after the tower is removed, the MIAL spokesperson said. The old tower will be demolished when all the operations are shifted to the new tower.

When the tower comes up,it will overlook the airport and the controllers will get a clear view of operations on both runways. It is located right in front of the airport because no other space was available,MIAL said. When we looked at other site options,we found no other place that was suitable from the operations point of view. The location of the new tower was finalised by AAI and MIAL, said the spokesperson.

The new ATC tower is expected to be visually appealing; the design by HOK International Limited won the Hong Kong Building Information Modelling (BIM) Award 2009.

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