Amritsar: Operations at Sri Guru Ram Das Ji International Airport in Amritsar were suspended for about 90 minutes on Sunday night after suspected drones were spotted near the airfield, forcing seven incoming flights to divert to Delhi and Chandigarh.
The alert came at around 9:45 pm when the Air Traffic Control unit received information from the Indian Air Force about drone activity over the airport area. Several aircraft were already waiting to land when the warning came in, according to Airport Director Anirudh Kumar Sharma.
Airport authorities followed their standard procedure for a drone sighting and activated a Joint Action Committee in the control tower. The committee assessed that continuing landings could put aircraft at risk, so the airport was closed for arriving flights at around 9:50 pm.
Seven flights that were approaching Amritsar had to be diverted. Two were sent to Chandigarh while five were diverted to Delhi. The affected flights included both domestic and international services.
The airport remained closed until around 11:15 pm. After no further drone activity was reported and the situation was considered under control, the committee cleared the airport to resume operations. Five of the diverted flights later returned to Amritsar, while one Air India flight that had gone to Delhi was cancelled. A Malaysia Airlines flight was expected to arrive later.
The incident has now moved into the investigation stage. Police are looking into the sighting and trying to establish whether the objects were actually drones, where they came from and who was operating them. There has been no official confirmation so far about their origin or purpose.
The location makes the incident particularly sensitive. Amritsar is close to the India-Pakistan border and the airport handles both domestic and international flights. Security agencies including the CISF and Punjab Police were alerted after the sighting and security vigilance was increased around the airport.
For passengers, the immediate disruption was brought under control within the night. But the incident highlights a growing problem for airports as small unmanned aircraft become easier to obtain and operate. Even when a drone does not enter the path of an aircraft, a sighting near a runway can be enough to stop landings until authorities are confident that it is safe to continue.
The investigation will now determine whether Sunday night’s sighting was an isolated incident or part of a wider security concern.
For now, authorities have confirmed the disruption and the flight diversions but have not established who was behind the suspected drone activity.
