IndiGo cancels 67 flights across airports amid bad weather and operational issues

Domestic carrier IndiGo cancelled 67 flights from multiple airports on Thursday due to forecasted bad weather and a small number of operational reasons, according to information available on the airline’s website.

Of the total cancellations, only four flights were attributed to operational issues, while the remaining were linked to forecasted adverse weather conditions at airports including Agartala, Chandigarh, Dehradun, Varanasi and Bengaluru, the website showed.

The cancellations come during the winter fog season, with the Directorate General of Civil Aviation having designated the period between December 10 and February 10 next year as the official fog window. Under DGCA fog operations or CAT-IIIB norms, airlines are required to roster pilots trained for low-visibility operations and deploy aircraft equipped to operate in such conditions.

Category III systems allow aircraft to land in dense fog, with Category III-A enabling landings at a runway visual range of 200 metres and Category III-B permitting landings at under 50 metre.

As per a report by PTI, IndiGo’s operations remain under DGCA monitoring following the cancellation of thousands of flights earlier this month. The airline is currently operating a curtailed schedule in line with a government directive. Under its original winter schedule, IndiGo was permitted to operate 15,014 domestic flights per week, or around 2,144 flights per day, about six per cent higher than its summer 2025 schedule of 14,158 weekly flights.

However, after widespread disruptions, including the cancellation of about 1,600 flights in a single day due to the implementation of new pilot rest norms, the government reduced the airline’s domestic capacity by 10 per cent, or around 214 flights per day. As a result, IndiGo is now capped at operating about 1,930 domestic flights daily during the winter season.

The Rahul Bhatia-controlled airline cancelled thousands of flights between December 1 and December 9, which were attributed to inadequate planning and crew shortages while implementing revised flight duty time and rest regulations that came into force on November 1, causing significant inconvenience to passengers.

Following the disruptions, the DGCA constituted a four-member panel comprising Joint Director General Sanjay Brahamane, Deputy Director General Amit Gupta, senior Flight Operations Inspector Kapil Manglik and FOI Lokesh Rampal to examine the root causes of the operational failures. The panel has already questioned IndiGo chief executive Pieter Elbers and chief operating officer Isidre Porqueras and is expected to submit its report this week.

In a travel advisory posted on X, IndiGo informed that low visibility and fog over Bengaluru had impacted flight schedules and stated that it was closely monitoring weather conditions to ensure safe and smooth operations.