By Shishir Prashant PrashantNews
After the tragic Air India plane crash at Ahmedabad, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation has carried out comprehensive surveillance at major airports including Delhi and Mumbai.
“DGCA is committed to safe air travel in India. As part of its commitment DGCA has initiated a focused assessment of the aviation ecosystem to strengthen safety measures across the aviation sector,” an official statement said on Tuesday.
Two teams led by the Joint Director General, DGCA carried out comprehensive surveillance during night and early morning hours at major airports, including Delhi and Mumbai. The surveillance covered multiple critical areas such as flight operations, airworthiness, ramp safety, air traffic control (ATC), communication, navigation and surveillance (CNS) systems, and pre-flight medical evaluations. Throughout the surveillance, ground activities and aircraft movements were closely monitored to check the compliance of regulatory requirements and to identify weak areas for improvement.
Findings made during the surveillance include:
Multiple cases wherein the reported defects re-appeared many times on the aircraft indicating the ineffective monitoring and inadequate rectification action on the defects/repeated defects; Ground handling equipment’s such as baggage trollies, BFL, etc were found unserviceable; Line maintenance stores, tool control procedures were not followed.
During maintenance of aircraft, the work order was not followed; The unserviceable thrust reverser system and Flap Slat Lever were not locked; During maintenance, safety precautions found not taken by AME as per AMM; at places, the AME was not attending to the snag rectification; Defect reports generated by the aircraft system, were not found recorded in the technical logbook; Several life vests were not properly secured beneath their designated seats; The corrosion-resistant tape on the right-hand side winglet’s lower blade was found to be damaged.
Similarly at an airport, centre line marking of runway was observed faded; The rapid exit taxiway, green centre lights were not unidirectional; the obstruction limitation data has not been updated for last three years and no survey has been performed despite many new constructions around the vicinity of aerodrome; number of vehicles in the ramp area were found without speed governors. These vehicles were withdrawn by cancelling there AVP and drivers ADP were suspended.
A simulator was checked and found not matching with the aircraft configuration. the software was not also updated to the current version.
A domestic flight of a scheduled carrier was cancelled due to worn tyres and it was released only after the required rectification was carried out. All the findings observed during the surveillance have been communicated to the concerned operators for taking necessary corrective actions within seven days.
This process of comprehensive surveillance will continue in future to detect hazards in the system.
The DGCA is the regulatory body in the field of Civil Aviation primarily dealing with safety issues and is fully committed for safety and security of air operations in the country.
The DGCA’s action came after the London-bound Air India flight crashed in Ahmedabad on June 12 killing 241 people on board that raised big concerns over the safety issues in the civil aviation sector.
