Clean-up operations at Calcutta airport on Thursday night. A Telegraph picture

The two-day strike by airport employees crippled passenger services but could not halt flight operations because of a band of bravehearts.

“Had it not been for the dedication of the personnel in air traffic service (ATS), immigration, customs and Central Industrial Security Force (CISF), the flight schedules in Calcutta would have gone haywire,” an airport official said on Thursday night, hours after the strike by the Airports Authority Employees’ Union was called off.

The ATS — which includes air traffic control (ATC) and the directorate of communication, navigation and surveillance (CNS) — is housed in the operations building, which was as badly hit by the strike as the lounges. On the night of March 12, the first day of the agitation, the building was without a drop of water as there was no one to operate the pumps.

“The toilets could not be used, the central air-conditioning system was not working and tea vendors were driven out by the agitators. The situation was hardly conducive to keeping a tab on aircraft, which calls for total concentration,” said an ATC official. The water tanks were refilled only in the morning of March 13.

The directorate of CNS, too, had to work under constraints. “We need to go on inspection of the radar and the instrumental landing system five to six times a day. During the strike, when CISF men doubled as drivers, there were only three inspections a day,” said an official.

It was also a harrowing time for the airline staff, who had to guide passengers without the basic facilities, like the public address system and the flight information display system. “At the security check-in counters, our staff held up placards with flight numbers and destinations written on it to guide passengers,” said an airline official.

Gill: The condition of Amarjeet Singh Gill, 55, who had slipped in a slushy toilet at the airport on Wednesday, improved on Friday. Doctors at Apollo Gleneagles Hospitals said he has been taken out of the Neuro Intensive Care Unit.