Hyderabad, May 18 (IANS): An Air India Express evacuation flight with 166 evacuees from Oman landed at Hyderabad's Rajiv Gandhi International Airport on Monday night.

Air India Express IX 0818 landed from Muscat (Oman) at 8.12 p.m. with 166 passengers, airport sources said.

This was the first flight to land in Hyderabad under the second phase of Vande Bharat Mission, the biggest ever evacuation exercise of India aimed to bring back Indian nationals stranded in various countries due to Covid-19 lockdown.

After completing all formalities, the passengers were transported to designated locations in the city for mandatory 14-day quarantine period as per the guidelines of Ministry of Home Affairs.

All passengers were facilitated with safety protocol through a fully sanitised airport terminal. To facilitate the arriving passengers and aircraft crew, the airport has kept the international arrivals and the entire stretch right from the aerobridge to the arrivals ramp fully sanitized and fumigated.

All arriving passengers and aircraft crew were brought out from the aircraft in a batch of 20-25 persons each. Each passenger/crew was screened by the thermal cameras positioned at the aerobridge exit under supervision of the Airport Health officials (APHO) as per the directives of Ministry of Health & Family Welfare prior to immigration formalities.

After the health screening of passengers, CISF personnel in their protective gear escorted the group of passengers to immigration clearance.

Glass shields were provided at each manned immigration counter to avoid any personal contact between the passengers and immigration officers.