Five reasons why the Chennai airport is jinxed

Last month Chennai airport trended on Twitter yet again for all the wrong reasons, after Siddharth Rao posted a tweet saying -

The tweet, which trended for a short while, led to a lot of passengers also sharing their experiences with birds at the ‘jinxed’ airport. However, even a month later, all that the Airport Authority of India (AAI) did was to appoint Narikuravas (a local gypsy community) to shoo away the pigeons. The Narikuravas are apparently experts when it comes to dealing with these birds. 

So what else has this airport been through? Here is a look - 

63 and still counting? 

The glass ceiling of the Chennai airport has collapsed an unbelievable 63 times since its inauguration in 2013, injuring passengers and airport personnel. After it fell for the 61st time, Supreme Court lawyer SK Swamy filed a petition where he noted that a glass panel had fallen four times within six months. 

Unavoidable floods

Even if the AAI manages to solve all the problems that the airport is dealing with, its bizarre solutions can never save the infrastructure from floods because it is built on the flood basin of the Adyar river.  

Water leakage from AC vents is a frequent phenomenon

After the floods last year that had partially drowned the city of Chennai, its airport is still reeling due to water leakage from AC vents. Authorities are apparently not concerned because they are still busy fixing the glass panels.

Held world’s worst airport title three years in a row

Chennai airport was voted as one of the worst airports in Asia by an international website called ‘The Guide to Sleeping in Airports.’ It was conducted last year among travellers who have travelled across the globe.

The website states, “Survey respondents who travelled to Chennai international airport are divided as to whether the baggage handling or the dirty bathrooms are the worst part of the experience. Baggage-wise, complaints begin with the sheer amount of time it takes for your bags to disembark from the plane. Once you have them, it is then unlikely that you'll find a working trolley or helpful staff – in spite of there being so many of them wandering around. Bathroom-wise, problems tend to stem from the leaking faucets, the dirty floors and the never-scrubbed toilets. This is all particularly remarkable given that the airport added a new terminal and a series of renovations in 2012.”