Hundreds stranded as Tacloban airport shuts down

TACLOBAN CITY, Philippines — At least 2,000 people were stranded on Wednesday when the biggest airport in Eastern Visayas closed down without prior notice.

The Daniel Z. Romualdez  Airport in San Jose District here shut down its operations after the last plane left at 5 p.m. on Tuesday to allow the repair of the potholes on the 2.2-kilometer-long runway.

“We ask for understanding of our passengers but at the same time, we cannot afford to compromise their safety and the planes using the airport,” said Allan Cahingcoy, officer-in-charge of the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines (CAAP) office in Tacloban.

The Daniel Z. Romualdez Airport. INQUIRER.net FILE PHOTO

He said the airport was scheduled to resume operations at 5 a.m. on Thursday.

But the temporary closure of the airport irritated many passengers because there was no prior notice.

The Tacloban airport, the gateway to Eastern Visayas provinces, serves the Manila and Cebu routes with 13 flights daily.

An announcement from the Manila International Airport Authority in Manila earlier on Wednesday said at least 38 flights to and from Tacloban had to be cancelled on Wednesday. The affected airlines were Cebu Pacific Air, TigerAir Philippines, AirAsia Zest, and Pal Express.

“We were not informed that there would be no flights today (Wednesday). We could have rescheduled our flight so we will not be stranded here,” said Maria Bautista, 74, who was bound for Manila en route to her home in Olongapo City.

She and brother, Lucas Galangue, 59, visited a sickly brother, Ricardo, 63, in Basey town, Samar.

The siblings were supposed to take the 1:20 p.m. Cebu Pacific flight.

Cahingcoy, however, said that they announced the temporary closure of the aiport over the local radio and television stations here.

The airline companies, he added, had been informed about it too.

Cahingcoy said the runway had to be repaired because some potholes were big enough to fit the landing gear of airplanes.

The runway had a total of 60 potholes, some measuring 5 feet by 10 feet and four inches deep.

Cahingcoy said the potholes have been there for months now and were aggravated by the arrival of several C-130 military planes from other countries and a C-17 from the United States at the peak the international airlift of aid for victims of Super Yyphoon “Yolanda.”

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