A Philippine Airlines flight from Manila took longer to arrive in Dumaguete Wednesday afternoon as strong tail winds forced it to divert to the Mactan Cebu International Airport.
PAL flight PR 2543 was expected to arrive at 3:23 p.m. at the Dumaguete-Sibulan airport and made a few tries. “It was scary,” passenger Gerry Anthony Velasco said.
The PAL aircraft stayed for more than an hour in Mactan before it departed and arrived safely at the Dumaguete airport at 5:45 p.m., to the applause of the relieved passengers.
Bad weather also cancelled the Cebu Pacific flight DG6517/DG6518 plying the Cebu-Dumaguete-Cebu route last Tuesday.
Dumaguete actually has two runways. One runs from east to west while the other is from west to east. When faced with strong tail winds from the east, planes usually land from from the mountain, or the western end of the runway.
However, the airport authorities closed that west to east runway last year over concerns of thick vegetation at the western end. The vegetation has since been cleared but the runway closure order has not yet been lifted.
There were reports last year that aircraft would have to be downsized in order to land at the Dumaguete airport due to the closure of that particular runway. (JFP)
