Road, water and air communications disrupted
Staff Correspondent
Dense fog on Saturday disrupted road, water and air communications throughout the country causing untold suffering specially to the city bound people who were returning to their respective cities including capital Dhaka after Eid celebration.
The fog forced flight operations at the Zia International Airport (ZIA) to be suspended for hours. All kinds of automobile vehicles specially passenger buses, goods laden trucks and covered vans which were running on roads and water vessels like launch and ferry had to stop their journey as fog started covering all the ways. Many vehicles met with the accident when the drivers ignoring fog were running their vehicles. As the sun remained invisible until morning in most of the places, motor vehicles had to move with their headlights on.
Fog also caused huge problems for road communications across the country particularly in the places where the buses and other vehicles have to cross the rivers by ferry.
While this correspondent was traveling from Barisal to capital Dhaka found that fog disrupting the ferry and launch services for seven hours early yesterday at Paturia-Daulatdia. Hundreds of buses and trucks were stranded on either side of the river. On the other hand, the ferry and launch services also remained disrupted due to dense fog. Thousands of the passengers were stranded on either sides of the route and suffered a lot amid biting cold due to the suspension of the ferry service.
Later in the morning ferry services on Paturia-Daulatdia, Daulatdia-Aricha and Maowa-Kawrakandi route in the river Padma resumed after eight hours of suspension of their service.
Zia International Airport (ZIA) official said a Dhaka bound Arab Emirate flight (EK 582) landed two hours late due to heavy fog. Another flight from Riyadh was supposed to land at 8:50am (Saturday), but it landed 12:30pm at the Zia International Airport. On the other hand, a Dhaka bound Dubai flight landed on Kolkata instead of Dhaka due to dense fog.
Many people could not go to office on due time because of sudden heavy fog yesterday. Alamgir Hossain, an accountant of a readymade garment factory told this correspondent, “I have started my journey from Patuakhali to Dhaka at 10:30am (Friday) night. Our bus reached Daulatdia Ghat at about 2pm (Saturday night). But ferry services were stopped from 1pm to 8am due to sudden heavy fog. As a result I could not attend office on due time.”
Courtesy: thebangladeshtoday.com
