Mumbai's Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport (CSMIA), which had earlier decided to keep all operations shut till 6 pm on Monday in view of the cyclone alert, has now extended the closure period to 8 pm.
"As the result of the cyclone alert, the closure of the operations at the airport has now been further extended till 2000 hours (8 pm) on May 17," CSMIA said in its latest operations update.
After announcing the suspension of all flight service at the facility from 11 am to 2 pm, initially, the private airport later extended it to 4 pm and then to 6 pm.
Further, three city-bound flights operated by budget carriers IndiGo and SpiceJet were diverted due to the closure of all services at the city airport.
A city-bound IndiGo flight was diverted to Hyderabad and a SpiceJet flight to Surat, while one IndiGo flight was sent back to Lucknow, as per CSMIA.
Meanwhile, gusty winds and heavy showers lashed Mumbai and its neighbouring areas on Monday as the "very severe cyclonic storm" Tauktae headed towards Gujarat, uprooting trees and disrupting local train services in the metropolis, officials said
The cyclonic storm over the Arabian Sea led to very strong winds blowing at a speed of 114 kmph in Mumbai on Monday afternoon, civic officials said. This was the highest wind speed recorded so far during the day, they said. The wind speed of 114 kmph was recorded around 2 pm at the weather station based at Afghan Church in south Mumbai's Colaba area, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) said in a release.
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