Dense fog disrupts flights, road, river communications

Poor visibility due to thick fog from Friday midnight to Saturday morning disrupted flights, road and river communications.
Due to low visibility on the rivers and highways, coupled with reckless driving, at least ten people were killed and 50 others injured in two serial road accidents on Bangabandhu Bridge around 7:30am, according to official sources in police.
The Bangladesh Meteorological Department in Dhaka on Saturday forecast that moderate to thick fog may occur over the river basins and light to moderate fog may occur elsewhere over the country during Saturday midnight to Sunday morning.
Civil aviation officials at Shahjalal International Airport in Dhaka said a flight of Turkish Airways was delayed for over five hours. The aircraft, scheduled to take off at 7:00am, finally took off at 2:30pm.
The domestic flights from Shahjalal were delayed by 30 to 45 minutes in the morning, the officials said.
The BIWTC control room in Dhaka said ferry services on Paturia-Daulatdia and Shimulia-Kawrakandi routes resumed at Saturday morning after around six-hour suspension since early Saturday due to dense fog and the rockets and launches on different river routs had to move slowly and cautiously due to low visibility.
At Paturia, operation of ferries resumed around 10:00am. Authorities had suspended ferry operation around 3:00am for the dense fog. At Shimulia, ferry operations resumed around 9:30am after a six-hour suspension.
Ro-Ro ferry Shah Jalal got stuck in the mid-river in Padma due to poor visibility said, Abdus Sattar, marine officer of Bangladesh Inland Water Transport Corporation, at Paturia.
The authorities decided to halt the ferry service around 3:00am to avoid accident and the ferry service would resume when visibility would become clear, he said.
At Shimulia, operation on Shimulia-Kawrakandi route remain suspended since 4:00am and five ferries anchored in mid-river with more than 300 vehicles due to dense fog.
BIWTC assistant manager Chandra Shekhar said they had suspended operation as five ferries were forced to anchor in mid river due to fog and the fog-lights even do not work.
New Age correspondents from districts across the country, referring to the commuters and drivers of roadway vehicles, said low visibility had forced them to ply their vehicles slowly and cautiously.
Even in the late morning, they reported, the vehicles had to use headlights for safety.

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