Fog Spillover Hits Hyderabad Flights With Cancellations

Published on Dec 17, 2025, 11:47 am CST

5 min read

Key points

Dozens of flights to and from Hyderabad were cancelled or delayed after dense fog in North India constrained operations at Delhi and other hubs
Rajiv Gandhi International Airport reported cancellations affecting major routes including Delhi, Mumbai, Patna, Ahmedabad, Chennai, and Pune
The disruption is propagating through aircraft rotations and crew legality, raising misconnect risk for domestic to international itineraries via hub banks
Travelers should prioritize airline app rebooking, protect onward ground legs with flexibility, and use clear thresholds to decide whether to wait or reroute

Impact

Where Impacts Are Most Likely: Connections that rely on Delhi's early morning bank and same day aircraft turns into Hyderabad face the highest cancellation risk
Connections And Misconnect Risk: Domestic to international chains and separate ticket itineraries through Delhi should plan for missed onward legs and longer rebooking times
Best Times To Travel: Midday and later departures typically perform better once visibility improves and arrival rates recover at northern hubs
What Travelers Should Do Now: Move tight connections, add buffers, and keep hotels and ground transfers flexible until the network clears delayed aircraft and crews

Flight disruption tied to dense winter fog in North India is now reaching deep into southern schedules, with cancellations and delays reported at Rajiv Gandhi International Airport (HYD) in Hyderabad, India. Travelers connecting through India's hub system, especially itineraries that touch Delhi, India, are most exposed because a single low visibility morning can break aircraft rotations and strand crews out of position. The practical move is to treat Hyderabad as part of the same weather disruption map as the northern hubs, then protect connections, hotels, and ground transfers with buffers and flexible bookings until recovery stabilizes.

The Hyderabad flight cancellations fog spillover is notable because it confirms the disruption is no longer confined to airports inside the fog footprint, it is now being transmitted through network dependencies that travelers often underestimate.

Reports from local coverage said at least 29 flights to and from Hyderabad were cancelled on Tuesday, with another wave of cancellations and delays starting Monday. The same reporting tied the cancellations to poor visibility constraints at Delhi's airport, and it listed affected Hyderabad routes including Delhi, Mumbai, Patna, Ahmedabad, Chennai, and Pune.

Who Is Affected

Travelers flying into or out of Hyderabad are affected first, especially those on schedules that depend on an aircraft arriving from the north and turning quickly back out. When the inbound leg is delayed or cancelled upline, the outbound can be cancelled even if weather is clear in Hyderabad, because the airplane, the pilots, or both are simply not there in time.

Connecting passengers are affected next. Hyderabad is a major spoke and connection point for domestic India travel, and it also feeds international departures for travelers starting in secondary cities. If a domestic leg into Hyderabad slips, same day international check in and baggage cutoffs become the failure point, and rebooking can force a next day departure and an extra hotel night.

Travelers transiting Delhi are still the highest risk segment because that hub is where low visibility procedures reduce the number of aircraft that can safely land and depart per hour. In mid December disruption, New Delhi reporting described hundreds of delayed flights and large scale cancellations at Indira Gandhi International Airport (DEL), with delays continuing even after visibility improved.

What Travelers Should Do

Recheck your flight status in your airline app before leaving for the airport, and assume last minute changes are possible until the morning fog window clears. If you have a choice, move to carry on only, avoid checking bags that force you into longer rebooking lines, and keep same day ground transfers and prepaid bus or rail legs refundable or easily changeable until you are wheels up.

Use a clear decision rule for rebooking versus waiting. If your itinerary depends on a tight turn, a short domestic connection, or a same day international departure, rebook proactively as soon as you see repeated rolling delays or a cancellation on your inbound aircraft's prior leg. If you are on a single ticket and you can accept arriving later the same day, waiting may be reasonable once departure banks at the northern hub restart, but if your flight is cancelled, assume capacity will be tight on the next available wave.

For the next 24 to 72 hours, monitor the fog forecast and the operational advisories rather than relying on a single airport's local weather. The India Meteorological Department warned that dense to very dense fog conditions were likely to persist across parts of North India in the coming days, which is the kind of setup that can repeatedly disrupt early morning banks. Also track airport and aviation authority advisories that emphasize checking flight status before traveling to the terminal, and expect knock on changes even if your departure airport is not in fog.

How It Works

Fog disruption spreads through the aviation system in layers. The first layer is airport acceptance rate. When visibility drops below key thresholds, airports may run low visibility procedures and increase spacing between arrivals and departures, which reduces runway throughput and forces air traffic control, ATC, to meter traffic. That creates holding, diversions, and delayed departures that push aircraft off their planned schedules.

The second layer is rotations. Most domestic aircraft in India fly multiple segments per day, and many routes are built around early morning and late evening banks. If a Delhi departure is suspended for hours, the aircraft that was supposed to fly Delhi to Hyderabad is now late, which can cancel Hyderabad's outbound legs later in the day even under clear skies. The same effect applies to the crews, because duty time limits and rest rules can prevent a crew from operating the next scheduled leg if delays push them past legal thresholds.

The third layer is traveler behavior and downstream logistics. Once cancellations spike, rebooking compresses remaining capacity, which increases the chance of involuntary overnighting. That raises demand for last minute hotel rooms, and it can break timed plans like same day check ins, meetings, or onward surface connections. The ripple is not just aviation, it becomes a ground transport and lodging problem at the destination as displaced passengers arrive in uneven waves.

For broader context on the wider multi region fog picture and how it affects airports outside the immediate fog zone, see India Winter Fog Flight Delays at North and East Airports and Delhi Smog and Fog Delay Flights and Trains.