Damage to lighting system: Probe into CJIA’s lighting system malfunction during storm launched

Operations at the Cheddi Jagan International Airport (CJIA) are returning to normalcy after a storm on Sunday evening disrupted flight schedules at the facility.
Intense thunderstorms and lightning, severely damaged several transformers and the lightening protection system of the runway lighting equipment at the Guyana’s international airport.
As a result, the airport runway lighting became inoperable forcing diversion of flights.
The runway is equipped with two independent circuits, each of which can facilitate aircraft landings.
Both the primary and alternate circuits were also impacted during the storm and as a result, all incoming flights had been diverted.
On Monday morning, however, the affected flights were returning to the airport. These flights included American Airlines, JetBlue, and Copa.
In an update on the situation Monday afternoon, the Public Works Ministry revealed that for the day so far, the airport had accommodated 10 flights, comprising a private aircraft, a cargo plane, and eight passenger flights.
It was noted that the return of flights were possible following repairs to one circuit of the runway lights, enabling night flight operations.
Efforts are underway by the maintenance team to restore the second circuit.
However, Public Works Minister, Juan Edghill has announced that an investigation has since been launched to determine the root cause of the airport’s malfunction.
He explained that the said investigations would shed some light on future preventive measures.

“The first thing we have to do is find out what went wrong because we have a lightning protection system and we have two circuits. In case one goes out we have the next one. But in this case, both went out…We have to develop measures to prevent that from reoccurring,” Edghill said. (G1)