Jharsuguda Airport Now Equipped with Ambulifts to Facilitate Flyers with Reduced Mobility

Bhubaneswar: Jharsuguda airport in Odisha is now equipped with Ambulifts to facilitate flyers with reduced mobility.

It is among the 14 AAI Airports to have such facility under the Accessible India Campaign (Sugamya Bharat Abhiyan) of Government of India.

To facilitate passengers with reduced mobility, Divyang passenger on wheel chair and passenger on stretchers, AAI has procured 20 ambulifts for the airports which are having scheduled flight operations of Code C & other advanced level aircraft but does not have aerobridge facilities. The Ambulift has been manufactured indigenously under the ‘Make in India’ policy, Ministry of Civil Aviation said in a press relase.

The facility is presently operational at 14 airports namely Dehradun, Gorakhpur, Patna, Bagdogra, Darbhanga, Imphal, Vijayawada, Port Blair, Jodhpur, Belgaum, Silchar, Jharsuguda, Rajkot, Hubli and remaining six are likely to be operational at Dimapur, Jorhat, Leh, Jamnagar, Bhuj & Kanpur airports by the end of this month.

The ambulifts can cater to six wheelchairs & two stretchers with an attendant at a time and is fitted with Heating Ventilation & Air-Conditioning system. The initiative taken up by AAI under Accessible India Campaign (Sugamya Bharat Abhiyan) of Government of India will provide convenient air travel to flyers with reduced mobility and. also help ‘Divyangjan’ at airports where aerobridge facility is not available. Procured at a cost of Rs. 63 lakhs per unit, AAI is providing Ambulift facility at a nominal token charge to the operating airlines at its airports.