3 days ago
Boundary wall at Madhya Pradesh's recently inaugurated Rewa airport collapses after heavy rain
A section of the boundary wall at Madhya Pradesh's Rewa Airport collapsed late Friday night after intense rainfall battered the region, sparking concerns over the quality of construction at the recently inaugurated facility.
Officials said the collapse occurred following a spell of heavy rain that caused rivers in Rewa district to overflow, submerging low-lying urban areas and displacing several families. The high-velocity water current breached a large stretch of the airport's perimeter wall, pushing a parked car several feet and causing motorcycles to float in the floodwaters.
Airport officials confirmed that around 5 feet of water entered the premises during the night.
'Heavy rain, similar to what we experienced last year, led to water gushing into the airport from nearby Umari village. The impacted section is at the lowest elevation of the boundary wall,' Navneet Chaudhary, senior manager at Rewa Airport, said, adding that the boundary wall was designed primarily for wind and structural weight resistance, not for withstanding high-velocity water flow.
Built at a cost of nearly Rs 500 crore, Rewa Airport was inaugurated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi last year, marking a major infrastructural milestone for the Vindhya region. However, even before its official launch, questions were raised about the structural integrity of the facility.
Responding to the allegations, airport authorities maintained that the wall's failure was not due to construction flaws but rather to extreme weather events.
'We cannot blame the construction quality entirely. Had we known in advance about the high flow of water from the village side, we would have installed grills up to the half-wall height,' Chaudhary said. He further stated that the damaged portion would be reconstructed with modifications, including the installation of grilles, which would allow rainwater to pass through without exerting pressure on the structure.
'Next time this won't happen, as the water would pass through the grill and pressure won't come on the wall,' he said.
