Airport authorities’ laxity in implementing rules is to blame for the death of Sankriti Sinha, an aircraft maintenance engineer with Air Deccan
Experts blame careless airport bosses for Deccan engineer’s death
BANGALORE: Airport authorities’ laxity in implementing rules is to blame for the death of 28-year-old Sankriti Sinha, an aircraft maintenance engineer with low-cost domestic carrier Air Deccan.
Violation of rules by agencies and carelessness by authorities in monitoring and punishing violators results in at least one collision every month at airports across the country.
“The death of Sankriti Sinha was culmination of the carelessness on the part of the agencies and authorities,” said an official at Chennai Airport, which witnesses at least two collisions a month.
The airport registers over 500 landings and take-offs everyday. The situation is worse at Mumbai International Airport. “Space constraint has resulted in congestion on ground and due to increase in the number of aircraft and ground support.
Though we do not expect what happened at Delhi Airport to happen, the situation here is no better, said Manish Kalghatgi, spokesperson of Mumbai airport, which witnesses over 700 flight movements everyday.
“With increasing number of oil tankers and ferry, cargo and catering vehicles, the situation has worsened. At least one collision is reported every month, but there are minor incidents of near collision at least once a week, which are not reported,” said an official at Mumbai airport.
The situation has worsened because of the new system of automatic assigning of bays as and when the flights land. “The new Apron Guiding System randomly allots bays depending on availability and the size of the aircraft, because of which airlines end up parking their aircraft in different directions. Hence their baggage and ferry vehicles are all over the place, creating confusion,” the official said.
Bangalore and Kolkata airports, however, report less number of collisions. With close to 400 flight movements everyday, Bangalore airport registers a minor incident a month. Same with Kolkata airport.
Though the airport authorities have made rules on apron discipline, these are hardly implemented. “It is compulsory that drivers undergo a seven-day training to obtain airport permit, usually the training is over in three days. At the end of the third day the drivers line up to answer questions related to signage and are issued passes in 15 minutes flat. With such system we cannot expect safety to be the utmost concern of the authorities,” said an official in Chennai.
“During construction work at airports, there is heavy movement of private vehicles who obtain passes for four or five drivers, who undergo training. But at the perimeter on the other side of the runway, the driver passes on the vehicle to another person who has not undergone the training. Apron controlling authorities do not conduct random checks, allowing untrained drivers to enter the airside leading to such incidents,” another official at Bangalore Airport said.
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