Rehabilitation of runway of Tribhuvan International Airport (TIA) is nearing to completion as the main work of runway rehabilitation project has completed.
Official of Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal (CAAN) stated that first phase of digging out and blacktopping the 3050 meter long runway has been completed which is regarded as main work of the project. Now another layer of blacktopping will be added.
All the remaining work is scheduled to be completed by the end of June. The work of blacktopping another layer has already begun and all the remaining work is scheduled to be completed soon.
The main layer of runway has been blacktopped by 20 centimeter and the new layer of blacktopping will be of around 6.5 centimeter thick.
Air Transport Capacity Enhancement Project of Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal (CAAN) initiated the runway rehabilitation on April 1, 2019 (Chaitra 18).
The up-gradation work of the runway of TIA is carried out from 10 PM to 8 every day. In order to conduct advance runway rehab, the airport is closed for 10 hours a day for the three months from April 1.
‘Runway Center-line light’ is also being installed at the runway. Previously there were only ‘edge light’ at the runway.
China Aero Technology International Engineering Corporation Chinese Company is in charge of the runway rehabilitation project of TIA. The agreement to rehabilitate the runway was signed on November 5, 2018 at cost of around NRs. 3.75 billion.
For the first time in the History of TIA, the runway of airport is being upgraded completely.
TIA’s runway was built in 1975. As per the international standard, runways of international airports should be refurbished with the use of new bitumen every 10 years. TIA, however, has never done that and because of that the flight operations were affected mainly on monsoon season.
The runway of TIA is being upgraded for the first time which makes the latest maintenance work at the tarmac the biggest since its construction.
