Why in the news?
On August 7, 2020, a Boeing 737 of Air India Express on a special ‘Vande Bharat’ mission flight from Dubai to Kozhikode overshot the runway. Kozhikode is a table-top airport.
Basic Facts
Table-top is an airport located and built on top of a plateau or hilly surface, with one or both ends of the runway overlooking a drop.
The airports in the country which would count as “tabletops”, are namely Lengpui (Mizoram), Shimla and Kullu (Himachal Pradesh), Pakyong (Sikkim), Mangaluru (Karnataka), Kozhikode and Kannur (both Kerala).
Although there is no such term as a ‘tabletop airport’ in any International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) technical document, but India’s statutory aviation body, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA), refers to these airports in this manner by way of highlighting safety measures during operations to these runways.
(Source: The Hindu)
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