Navi Mumbai International Airport welcomes its first commercial aircraft: likely take-off by mid-2025

The much-awaited Navi Mumbai International Airport (NMIA) may start commercial flight operations within a few months as an A320 aircraft from Indigo Airlines successfully touched down today at the airport runway in Panvel, as part of the initial commercial flight validation test.

Prior to the landing of the validation flight, NMIA successfully conducted the flight calibration of the Instrument Landing System (ILS) and Precision Approach Path Indicator (PAPI), subsequently drafting instrument approach procedures to prepare itself for the arrival of the validation flight.

On 11 October 2024, the inaugural landing of an Indian Air Force C-295, a large multi-role tactical airlifter aircraft had landed at the Greenfield International Airport.

NMIA, scheduled in four phases and the first phase planned to take off by April 2025, is spread on an area of 1160 acres in and around Panvel. Once complete, the airport will have the capacity to manage over 90 million passengers per annum (MPPA). In the initial phase, NMIAL is implementing a passenger capacity of 20 MPPA and 800,000 tons per annum of cargo handling capacity. The second airport in Mumbai may incur an expenditure of about ₹16,700 crore.

Currently, a 3.70-kilometre runway is ready, and the second runway is under construction. Construction of the airport was started in 2018, though the project was in the planning phase for more than 20 years. 

''The successful completion of the validation flight is a major milestone, and we are now one step closer to operationalising the airport, prioritising safety at every step,'' said Arun Bansal, Chief Executive Officer, Adani Airport Holdings.

NMIAL is part of Adani Airports Holdings Limited and is owned by Mumbai International Airport Limited (MIAL) (74% shareholding) and City and Industrial Development Corporation of Maharashtra Limited (CIDCO) (26% shareholding).