Qatar Airways flight grounded for two hours

A Qatar Airways flight was grounded at Ibrahim Nasir International Airport for two hours tonight. GMR claimed overdue payments as a reason for not allowing the flight to depart.

A GMR Official said that Qatar Airways had failed to pay the increased amount in handling fees from November last year. The flight was supposed to depart at 7.00pm bound for Doha.

“Our policy is to ground the flights if the airline fails to make the payments within a specified duration,” the Official said.

He said that the flight has now been allowed to take off following an agreement between both parties involved. He did not indicate if the airline paid the charges

Qatar Airways has recently warned against discontinuation of the operation of flights to Maldives. Sri Lankan Airlines has also made the decision to cease the operation of direct flights between Maldives and Europe. Thomson is considering a reduction in the number of flights to the Maldives.