Bali airport temporarily closed over chipped runway

Damage to the runway has Bali’s I Gusti Ngurah Rai Airport temporarily closed for Friday morning. 

The closure will run until 12 pm today, according to the Transportation Ministry’s head of Information and Communication, Hemi Pamuraharjo. 

The runway is cracked about five centimeters deep, reports said. 

“From the result of the runway inspection this morning, five meters from the center line of runway 09, there was a rack with dimensions of approximately 18 by 25 centimeters, with a depth of five centimeters,” AFP quoted Pamuraharjo as saying. 

As a result of the airport’s temporary shutdown, a number of flights to and from Bali have experienced delays today.

“For flights from Bali, 21 have been delayed. For international flights arriving in Bali, two were delayed. While flights from Bali, international, there have been as much as 11 delays,” Pamuraharjo said. 

With all those delays, let’s hope the airport reopens at noon, as scheduled!

This isn’t the first time in recent months that Ngruah Rai Airport has closed over runway damage. A similar temporary shutdown in July 2016 over runaway disrepair had planes circling overhead.