Daily Times

Another building at the newly constructed Islamabad International Airport, which was completed last year with a whopping amount of Rs 81 billion, has developed cracks, Daily Times has learnt.

According to details, cracks have appeared in the most premier building of the Customs Department, which may collapse anytime.

In October last year, a Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) official was injured when an aerobridge collapsed, while four employees of Gerry’s dnata suffered injuries when the ceiling of the baggage handling section collapsed.

A four-member inquiry board headed by Deputy Director General of Airport Services Syed Amir Mehboob and comprising Director Projects Lahore Airport Siddiqur Rehman, Manager Peshawar Airport Ubaid-ur-Rehman and Senior Deputy Director Kamal Khan was formed but still the inquiry report had not been prepared.

A credible source, wishing to remain unnamed, in the Civil Aviation Authority, told Daily Times that the building had collapsed due to poor engineering and designing.

The source added that the soil of the tarmac was used in the filling process before the construction of the building.

“We have observed various engineering and designing faults in the building,” said an engineer, who inspected the building after it developed cracks.

When contacted, another senior official of the Civil Aviation Authority, said that the building was inaugurated in a haste. “The government wanted early inauguration of the project that was why the compaction process was avoided while constructing the building.

He, however, did not reply when Daily Times asked him whether the compaction was avoided in one building or others as well.

Farah Hussain, the spokesperson for the Civil Aviation Authority, said that the cracks had appeared in the building. She said an inquiry committee headed by experts had been constituted to investigate the faults inside the building.

She added that when the inquiry report would be shared will be shared with the media.

Published in Daily Times, January 14^th 2019.