1,413 passengers affected by flight cancellations, delays
SIBU: A total of 1,413 passengers were affected by flight cancellations and delays as Sibu Airport resumed operation yesterday.
Out of the number, 782 were inbound passengers while 631 were outbound.
The airport was closed to air traffic after a Malaysia Airlines Boeing 737- 800 aircraft skidded upon landing at the airport on Saturday night.
Malaysia Airports Sibu manager Zainuddin Abu Nasir said there were 14 retimed and six cancelled flights from the 50 scheduled flights for the whole of yesterday.
“The first aircraft to arrive in Sibu this morning ( yesterday) is MH3401 from Miri, landing here at 9.28am carrying 51 passengers. MH3401 is also the first aircraft to depart from Sibu to Kuching at 9.53am with 61 passengers.
“Today ( yesterday), there are 50 scheduled flights, with 14 retimed and six cancelled,” he told a press conference at the airport here yesterday, which was the third since Saturday.
For the record, Malaysia Airlines had two cancelled flights ( Sibu/ KL) while MASwings had four ( Kch/Sibu/ Btu and KK/Sibu/Miri).
As for retimed flights, Malaysia Airlines had two ( KL/ Sibu/ KL), MASwings also two ( Miri/Sibu/ Kch) and AirAsia retimed 10 flights (Kch/Sibu/Kch, KL/Sibu/KL, Kch/Sibu/Kch, JB/ Sibu/JB and KL/Sibu/KL).
Zainuddin said the first departure (from Sibu) was supposed to be at 6am yesterday
The first aircraft to arrive in Sibu this morning (yesterday) is MH3401 from Miri, landing here at 9.28am carrying 51 passengers. MH3401 is also the first aircraft to depart from Sibu to Kuching at 9.53am with 61 passengers. Zainuddin Abu Nasir, Malaysia Airports Sibu manager
involving Malaysia Airlines aircraft, but it did not arrive from KL, making it the first cancellation for yesterday.
The airport was open at midnight yesterday - 12 hours ahead of schedule. It was originally scheduled to start operation only from noon yesterday as disclosed by Zainuddin in a notification received near midnight yesterday.
The incident on Saturday night had forced a total of 48 flights to be cancelled on Sunday – leaving 3,787 passengers stranded.
Malaysia Airlines Flight MH2718 was carrying 69 passengers, comprising 61 adults, two infants and a crew of six. All on board were Malaysians and there was no casualty and injury reported.
On the disabled aircraft, Zainuddin said the operation to remove it started at 5pm on Sunday and was completed at 7pm.
“The crisis ended yesterday ( Sunday) when the aircraft was removed from the area where it skidded and brought to a designated place. It has been close to 26 hours of endurance for us,” he said.
He said there was no damage to the runway, and it had been intact and functioning all the while, and the grass strip area had been patched up.
As for the cause of the incident, he said it was still under investigation by Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau (AAIB) and the Ministry of Transport would announce the findings in due course.
As such, he said all matters relating to the aircraft would be answered by Malaysia Airlines, adding their main concern is to ensure serviceability of all facilities in the airport.
Among those present was Malaysia Airports Sibu head of operation Abang Yakub.