Updated on Thursday, January 08, 2009, 00:00 IST

Mumbai, Jan 08: Domestic airlines faced delays in Mumbai on Thursday as refuelling services were hit due to ongoing strike by the 55,000 officers of 14 state-run oil companies.

Flights are getting delayed by an average of 45 minutes and could aggravate as the threat of ATF supplies going dry looms large.

Yesterday there was an average 25 to 30 minutes delay in the flights, and four Air India domestic flights were delayed due to the ongoing strike.

Meanwhile, Jet Airways Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Wolfgang Prock-Schuaer said that they have made arrangements at its end, so that the effect is minimal on them.

Vijay Mallya-owned private airline, Kingfisher Airlines, had said that it was monitoring the situation closely and was fully prepared to deal with the situation.

"We do not anticipate any immediate impact on the proposed strike and all flights will operate as per schedule," a Kingfisher Airlines statement said.

The officers of 13 oil PSUs stayed away from work, which hit oil and gas production at Western Offshore.

Meanwhile, Oil Sector Officers Association (OSOA) leadership continued to remain underground with no fresh arrests happening. Two ONGC officers association members were arrested yesterday and there have been no further arrest.

"As of now we are maintaining fuel supply at petrol pumps and continue operating aviation services at airports but if the strike continues for another one or two days there are bound to be dry ups at petrol pumps," Indian Oil Corporation Chairman Sarthak Behuria said.

Gail Chairman UD Choubey said the nation's main trunk pipeline Hazira-Vijaypur-Jagdishpur (HVJ) continued to remain out of operation as ONGC failed to supply natural gas.

ONGC Chairman R S Sharma is likely to visit Hazira later in the day in an attempt to convince the company officers to resume production from the main gas field in the Western offshore.