Devotees miss aerial view as rain plays spoilsport

Incessant rain on Thursday played havoc with the plans of those who wanted to witness the Ganpati immersion from the sky. According to sources, a charter operator had booked 65 people for joyrides, but owing to poor visibility all operations had to be suspended. Another operator, which had booked 138 passengers, managed to accommodate only 35 passengers in eight sorties after 5 pm on Thursday owing to rain.

Sources from the Juhu aerodrome air traffic control said there was poor visibility for a distance of one to two kilometres and it was almost impossible for the charter operators to take off. Flying operations could be started only after 5 pm.

According to sources from the private charter industry, in most of the cases, people wanted to witness the Ganpati immersion and thus these passengers were forced to cancel their tickets. Almost 80 per cent passengers cancelled their ticket owing to rain and bad weather, said sources.

Rajendra Johari, CEO of Aman aviation, told this paper that their company had booked 60 to 70 people and the operator had received a flying slot of five and a half hours but not a single aircraft was able to take off. “We have qualified pilots and we can fly with a visibility of 1.5 kilometres but visibility was constantly low; some times visibility comes and goes in patches but this time it disappointed us,” Mr Johari said.

Nandan Koregaonkar, head of Yagna aviation, said the company had booked 138 passengers but only 38 were lucky enough to witness the Ganpati immersion from sky. This operator, however, provided service from 5 pm till 6.30 pm.

A Bandra resident Priyanka Agrawal Gupta who missed the ride said, “I always wanted to witness Ganpati immersion from the sky as it allows you to witness many immersions and saves you from the crowd too.”

However, Krishna Kumar, a Delhi resident was lucky enough to visit the immersion from the sky. “I had heard a lot about the Ganpati festival of Mumbai and this year we planned to witness it from air. We waited for many hours but it was worth the while. I saw many idols getting immersed,” he said.