The New Indian ExpressFirst Published : 27 May 2011 10:24:00 PM ISTLast Updated : 28 May 2011 12:30:48 AM IST
Thursday’s air crash near Delhi which claimed 10 lives, might have been averted if a number of precautionary measures were taken. First was the need to warn the air ambulance coming from Patna about the deteriorating weather conditions in Delhi. Considering that even Boeings coming from the east found it difficult to stick to their flight path because of the high winds, the tiny nine-seater had no chance of survival unless its flight path was diverted. Although the meteorological department did issue a warning late in the evening, it wasn’t in time for the single-engine turboprop and its ill-fated passengers.
It is only now that the civil aviation ministry has called for equipping all small planes with black boxes and making it mandatory for all medical flights to be in two-engine planes. For the present, the absence of a cockpit voice recorder and digital flight data recorder in the crashed plane means that the real causes of the crash will never be known. All that can be surmised is that the aircraft was being badly tossed around by the gusty winds, considering that the pilot reported bad weather when the plane had virtually stalled and was then found ascending to 14,000 feet even after being told to descend to 11,000 feet.
The belated, knee-jerk reaction of the aviation authorities has underlined yet again their lackadaisical approach to safety regulations. Such laxness is all the more regrettable considering that April and May have been fatal months for air travel with 37 people having died in the period. They include the former Arunachal Pradesh chief minister, Dorji Khandu, and 18 tourists who were travelling in a helicopter in the northeast. Given the increasing popularity of air travel even by the middle classes and the rise in air traffic, the urgency of bringing the safety regulations to international standards is obvious. But, as the scandal of fake pilots showed, the ministry and the DGCA have been unable to get their acts together
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