The government is preparing to appoint an immediate consultant for the construction of Nijgadh International Airport.
Sanjeev Gautam, General Director of Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal (CAAN) has decided to appoint a consultant within a month to prepare a plan for construction of Nijgadh International Airport.
Speaking at a program held in Kathmandu on 20th anniversary of the CAAN, he said that the agreement with Nepalese Army has been signed to work for cutting trees for the construction work.
Director General Gautam has also planned to give detailed design of first phase of the airport to consultant.
CAAN has claimed that the construction work of national pride project, Gautam Buddha International Airport and Pokhara Regional International Airport will be completed before time-frame.
Director General Gautam said that the necessary preparation are being made for conducting night flights at Chandragadhi and Janakpur airport.
Bijay Yadav, Engineer of the project stated that the construction work has achieved 60 per cent physical progress till now despite of deadline extension.
The airport will be developed in three phases. The first phase, as per the detailed feasibility study (DFS) of the project, will be of 10 years; the second phase will be of 5 years, and the third or final phase will be of 25 years.
The project envisions building a modern airport in Nijgadh in Bara district, 175 km from Kathmandu in the southern plains.
In the first phase, two years will be spent for site clearance works, and then another five years will be spent on constructing the airport that will have 3,600-meter-long and 60-meter-width runway. According to the DFS of the Landmark Worldwide Company (LMW) of South Korea, after the first phase of the construction is complete, the airport will be able to handle 15 million passengers annually and accommodate the Airbus A380 super jumbo.
By the end of the third phase, the airport will have a parallel runway enabling it to handle 60 million passengers annually. If built, the Nijgadh International Airport will be an air hub joining 27 Asian cities and generate over 100,000 jobs, according to LMW report.
The authority said that the policy of building helipad in the village, “Helipad construction and operation procedure, 2075 has been implemented.
Currently, there are 50 airports in Nepal among them only 32 airport are in operations.
