180 flights cancelled at Amsterdam's airport over fuelling
The Hague: Thousands of passengers flying to and from Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport faced delays and cancelled flights Wednesday due to problems refuelling planes at the busy European aviation hub.
Airport spokeswoman Willemeike Koster said 180 flights were cancelled at the airport just outside Amsterdam, stranding passengers at Schiphol and other airports.
Field beds were being set up at the airport as a precaution in case passengers were forced to wait overnight for their flights, Koster told The Associated Press.
It was not clear how many passengers were affected by the delays and cancellations, but Koster said the number ran into the thousands.
The airport said a company that supplies fuel to planes at the airport has "a fault in their system. That means that planes cannot be refuelled right now, which is causing delays."
The airport said it was working with the company, Aircraft Fuel Supply, to try to resolve the problem. "It is still unclear how long this will take, but we expect it to last long into the evening," Schiphol said.
"We regret any inconvenience for travellers and airlines."
Only one-third of the usual number of flights was arriving at Schiphol on Wednesday night, Koster said. Even fewer were leaving.
"If they have enough fuel they can go," Koster said. "There are planes departing, but it is at a minimum level."
Dutch airline KLM said it was possible flights would be cancelled Thursday as well due to an "phased restart" of operations at the airport.
The fuel problem came during the busy summer vacation period in the Netherlands and on a day that saw a heat wave set a record high temperature.
The Dutch weather service Weerplaza said the southern city of Eindhoven reported a temperature of 39.3 degrees C (102.7 F), the hottest day in the country in 75 years.
Airport spokesman Hans van Kastel told Dutch broadcaster NOS that the fuel issue was not believed to be linked to the hot weather.
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Confident we are going to win Kerala: Shashi Tharoor
New Delhi (PTI): Congress leader Shashi Tharoor on Thursday expressed confidence in the victory of the United Democratic Front (UDF) in Kerala, saying the Congress-led alliance will win more than 75 seats out of the total 140 in the state.
Tharoor, who hails from Kerala, said he was not surprised to see the results of the exit polls, most of which predicted a victory for the UDF that has been out of power for 10 years in the state.
"We have been on the ground. I have campaigned in 59 constituencies across 12 districts out of 14. I was very confident we are going to win.
"Everything that I have picked up from not just my party colleagues and workers but also from other observers, media and others have always convinced me that we were going to score a comfortable win of above 75 seats. And all the (exit) polls have confirmed the same thing," he told reporters here.
The Thiruvananthapuram MP said he was not surprised to see the results of the exit polls but in general he was not a big fan of exit polls in India.
"Because ours is not purely a homogenous society. We have to take into account gender issue, caste issue, class issue, regional disparities. You never get a convincingly large enough sample to give an accurate poll and now there is the additional complication that we have heard about in West Bengal this year that many people are unwilling to answer the questions of the pollsters," he said.
The Congress leader said normally, it used to be below 10 per cent that people said that they would not answer.
"Even if you are a reputable exit pollster, in Bengal, one polling company has said 60 per cent of people refused to answer. So, what is the worth of a poll where 60 per cent of your respondents have not answered," he said.
Several exit polls on Wednesday predicted a comeback by the Congress-led UDF in Kerala after 10 years, dethroning the CPI(M)-led Left Democratic Front (LDF).
Polling for the 140-member Kerala assembly was held on April 9. Results of assembly elections in West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Assam, Puducherry, besides Kerala, will be announced on May 4.
