Pokhara airport is undergoing runway renovation project and is going to be closed 15 hours daily for the construction work starting soon.
The Pokhara airport is being upgraded nearly after a decade and flight operation to the airport is closed from 3 in afternoon to 6 in the morning from November 18. The project is expected to be completed in 15 days.
The runway, roads around the runway, taxiway and apron are being maintained. All the blacktopped areas are going to be upgraded as they were degrading in recent time, stated an official.
The runway will be laid with asphalt like substance known as slurry seal which is the application of a mixture of water, asphalt emulsion, aggregate (very small crushed rock), and additives to an existing asphalt pavement surface. This is set to make runway safe for coming 3 years.
The runway will not be fully overlaid by asphalt as it takes time as well as new airport in Pokhara is expected to be constructed soon thus, to continue the flight operation in this peak tourism season, the runway is going to be upgraded via the seal.
The runway renovation is expected to be completed in 2 weeks whereas other works will take around a month to be completed and the expense cost is expected to be NRs. 99 Millions.
Pokhara domestic airport has runway length of 1440 meters on an elevation of 2696 feet above the sea level aligned to 040 degrees and 220 degrees serving as one of the country’s major tourist’s air link in the country.
Most of the domestic airlines operate to the airport and some of them even use big aircraft like ATR 72-500 series aircraft that makes great impact on the runway. And being the peak season, more than 40 such aircraft are being operated from the airport thus the method of using the seal is applied as the work can be completed in short time.
