Aviation News May 17 2011

New Delhi: The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) has been in news for all the wrong reasons of late, after it was discovered that large-scale nepotism within the regulator’s office was leading to a number of ‘fake’ pilots taking to the skies.
No wonder the government has not received a single application from eligible candidates for the post of director general in the last two months.
The position had come up for renewal since the current incumbent, EK Bharatbhushan, lacks the mandatory 12-year aviation experience needed for the job and the government wanted an aviation professional to head DGCA, instead of an IAS officer, as has been the norm so far.
None of Bharatbhushan’s immediate juniors qualifies for the job as per the new criteria, which require 12 years of aviation, flying, aircraft, engineering or airworthiness experience. But what Bharatbhushan lacks in experience, he has more than made up with his sincerity in tackling the entire fake pilot scam.
Officials in the Ministry of Civil Aviation confirmed that not a single application has been received for the director general’s post and now the ministry has written to the Union Public Service Commission to relax the appointment criteria.
17/05/11 Sindhu Bhattacharya/Daily News & Analysis

India Still Not Ready To Accommodate A380

International airlines are facing headwinds from the Indian aviation ministry following the administration’s decision not to allow the Airbus A380 to fly into the country.
The Ministry of Civil Aviation withheld permission for foreign airlines because the country’s airport infrastructure is not adequate to handle the movement of the A380. "It might cause chaos at the airports. The height of the aerobridge is not adequate; the taxiing stands also need to be widened,” a senior official at the ministry tells Aviation Week.
The government’s move has put Lufthansa’s route planning arrangements in jeopardy and has caused concern in the Gulf states, where airlines have designed much of their networks around servicing the long-haul travel needs of India’s growing population. "We applied for the ministry’s permission two years ago but still haven’t received a yes or a no,” a spokesman at Lufthansa says.
The airline, which had recently increased its flights from Frankfurt and Munich to New Delhi, was expecting to secure the permission soon as it had factored in an A380 for India in its route planning. Currently, Lufthansa has seven of these aircraft and was planning to deploy the new jet on the Indian route from May. The airline official has also rejected the ministry’s argument about the lack of proper airport infrastructure saying: "The Terminal 3 airport in New Delhi was constructed to accommodate the A380.”
17/05/11 Aviation Week

How much loss did Air India strike cause?

New Delhi: The Delhi high court on Monday sought from Air India the exact reasons behind the recent nationwide strike by its pilots. It also wanted details of the revenue loss caused on account of the agitation. A bench of chief justice Dipak Misra and justice Sanjiv Khanna asked Lalit Bhasin, the lawyer appe
aring for Air India, to file a detailed affidavit in this regard by August 10.
The court had, on May 9, decided to look into the problems faced by Air India, leading to the strike by its pilots saying, "It is a matter of public interest… which the nation wants to know.”
A petition filed by the pilots’ union of the national carrier had been converted into a public interest litigation (PIL) by the court. "The nation wants to know what factors are afflicting the national carrier Air India. In order to set those controversies at rest, we are prime facie of the opinion that all the circumstances leading up to the strike should be considered and decided by treating the case as a PIL,” the bench said.
17/05/11 Harish V Nair /Hindustan Times

When evidence reached scrap metal shops

Air India Express flight 812: An investigation gone hauntingly wrong-II

Stage 1 Identify the various pieces and arrange them in their relative positions
Stage 2 Examine in detail the damage to each piece, and establish the relationship of this damage to the damage on adjacent or associated pieces.

Before commencing reconstruction work, 1. Photograph the entire site and wreckage.2. Complete the wreckage distribution chart.3. Inspect and make notes on the manner in which the various pieces were first found, by walking around the site.

The difficulty in reconstructing a component, such as a wing, lies in identifying the various pieces of wreckage. If the wing has broken up into a few large pieces, the task is relatively simple. If, on the other hand, the wing has broken into a number of small pieces as a result of high impact speed, reconstruction can be extremely difficult. The most positive means of identification are: • Part numbers which are stamped on most aircraft parts, which can be checked against the aircraft parts catalogue• Colouring (either paint or primer)• Type of material and construction• External markings• Rivet or screw size and spacing.

Whenever an accident occurs, the Owner, Operator, Pilot-in-Command, Co-pilot of the aircraft shall take all reasonable measures to protect theevidence and to maintain safe custody of the aircraft and its contents for such a period as may be necessary for the purposes of an investigationsubject to the Indian Aircraft Rules 1937. Safe custody shall include protection against further damage, access by unauthorized persons.