Hyderabad, May 11: The GMR Hyderabad International Airport on Monday handled the arrival of the second evacuation flight under Vande Bharat Mission from the United States of America on May 11. The national carrier - Air India flight - AI 1617 - from San Francisco (USA) arrived via Mumbai at the Hyderabad International Airport today at 09.22 am with 118 Indian citizens stranded in the USA.Later in the day, GMR Hyderabad International Airport is all set to receive another batch of Indian citizens from Abu Dhabi (UAE).

The Air India Flight - AI 1920 - is expected to arrive at around 9.30 pm today.To facilitate the arriving passengers and aircraft crew, the airport has kept the international arrivals and the entire stretch right from the aerobridge to the arrivals ramp fully sanitised and fumigated, sources informed. Vande Bharat Mission: Air India's First Mumbai-Bound Repatriation Flight with 155 Passengers Departs from San Francisco International Airport.

The airport also enforced social distancing among passengers right from the aerobridge to across the terminal. All arriving passengers and aircraft crew from the US were brought out from the aircraft in batches of 20-25 persons each.

Each passenger/crew was screened by the Thermal Cameras positioned at the aerobridge exit under the supervision of the Airport Health officials (APHO) as per the directives of MoHFW (Ministry of Health and Family Welfare) prior to immigration formalities.

After the health screening of passengers, CISF personnel in their protective gear escorted the group of passengers to immigration clearance.Glass shields were provided at each manned immigration counter to avoid any personal contact between the passengers and immigration officers. Each counter had specified social distancing norms in place.

All baggage was sanitised by the disinfection tunnel integrated to the baggage belt as arranged by the airport. The baggage trolleys were kept fully sanitised for passengers' use. The passengers were also provided seating arrangement with complimentary boxes of food.As per the government's norms, the passengers were taken for mandatory 14-day quarantine to the designated locations in the city.

To meet this emergency requirement, apart from the State/Central government representatives, State Police, CISF (Central Industrial Security Force), immigration, customs, a select group of personnel from GHIAL terminal operations, airside operations, AOCC (Airport Operations & Control Centre), ATC (Air Traffic Control), IT team, landside security, airline ground handlers, ARFF (Airport Rescue and Fire Fighting) services, RAXA security, trolley operators, housekeeping staff, among others were available to ensure safe and seamless arrivals of the passengers.

According to sources, till May 11, 2020, GMR Hyderabad International Airport has handled 12 departures evacuation flights serving over 900 foreign nationals who were repatriated by various special relief flights from Hyderabad to countries like the UK, the UAE, the US, Kenya and Germany.