24 Mindanao flights cancelled due to bad weather

INQUIRER FILE PHOTO

MANILA, Philippines — At least 24 flights, mostly to and from Cagayan de Oro City, were cancelled  at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport on Wednesday as bad weather continued to affect many parts of Mindanao despite the dissipation of a low pressure area that had been battering it for nearly two weeks.

Twenty of the were to or from Laguindingan International Airport in Cagayan de Oro; the four others were flights to Butuan City and their return trips, according to a 4 p.m. advisory from the Manila International Airport Authority, operator of NAIA.

In the past week, flights to and from Cagayan de Oro and other Northern Mindanao cities were frequently cancelled due to the weather disturbance, which at one point had intensified into a depression but weakened back to a low pressure area before finally dissipating on Wednesday.

At NAIA Terminal 3, stranded passengers queued to rebook their flights, with some deciding to postpone their travel toward the weekend, expecting the weather to have improved by then.

One passenger on a 5 a.m. flight to Cagayan de Oro recounted to the Philippine Daily Inquirer over the phone that the plane managed to leave NAIA but was unable to land at Laguindingan due to bad weather.

The plane landed at Davao International Airport to refuel and tried again to fly to Cagayan de Oro. Failing in the attempt, the plane returned to Manila at around 11 a.m.

“The cloud cover is thick and we were told it was raining there (Laguindingan) and the wind was strong, so the (pilot) decided to return to NAIA,” he said.

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