Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) has resumed flight operations to the Gulf on Tuesday after a brief closure of the Gulf airspace on Monday night.
The airspace of the UAE, Bahrain, Kuwait, and the Gulf was briefly closed for a few hours following the missile attacks by Iran on the American base in Qatar. Hence, the flights were suspended. Hence, PIA had suspended its flight operations to the Gulf region temporarily.
“The safety of our passengers remains our top priority,” the PIA spokesperson said. “We deeply regret the inconvenience caused by the flight cancellations, but these steps are necessary under the current circumstances.”
PIA had assured that flights would resume soon after the opening of the airspace. Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) has reported delays ranging from 4 to 13 hours on flights to various Gulf countries. Across major airports including Karachi, Lahore, and Islamabad, a total of 55 flights have been delayed.
Earlier, the PIA pilot flying over Damam captured the video of Iran’s ballistic missiles launched towards Israel, in a video released over social media.
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The pilot shared the footage of the missiles heading towards Israel on social media. The video was captured on Monday evening. The event transpired while flight PK-168, transporting Pakistani citizens from Al-Qassim, Saudi Arabia, to Islamabad, Pakistan, was traversing Saudi airspace near Dammam.
The PIA spokesperson confirmed the event and confirmed that the flight was flying at an altitude of 35,000 feet when the pilot captured the barrage of ballistic missiles towards Israel crossing over Saudi Arabian territory.
The footage came amid a time when Israel and Iran were engaged in a fierce military escalation. Both countries launched aerial strikes against each other for more than a week. Iran and Israel are claiming to inflict heavy losses on each other during the ongoing conflict.
Israel launched strikes on Iran early on Friday, which saw several elite military figures and scientists assassinated. Iran retaliated with drones and later strikes of its own. In retaliatory fire, Israel targeted Iran’s gas fields and oil refineries.