Pakistan

Pilot's fatigue may be behind crash: Palpa President

President of Pakistan Air Lines Pilots Association (Palpa), Captain Sohail Baloch on Wednesday said Margalla Hills...

July 28, 2010

President of Pakistan Air Lines Pilots Association (PALPA), Captain Sohail Baloch on Wednesday said Margalla Hills plane crash may be attributed to pilot's fatigue.

"The pilot may be suffering from accumulated fatigue because they are not given adequate leaves," he told a private news channel. Captain Sohail Baloch said the route was not a no-fly zone, as speculated.

The plane exceeded the safety distance due to bad weather.

He said this decision was, again, taken by the pilot who could not determine appropriate landing route and added the ISL system's access ends a little before Islamabad and the pilot had to resort to visual queues for landing.

There could be other reasons to the crash, which will only be uncovered after completion of investigation, he added.

Airport sources said the Air Blue flight ED-202 took off at7:50 am from Karachi to Islamabad and crashed at 9:50 a.m.

COMMENTS (19)

numra | 14 years ago | Reply if the air line is so true then why dont they bring that man on media who was guiding the pilot at that time. Yes, i m talking about the air traffic controller of flight ED 202. may be he guided the pilot wrong. and this is the most stupid thing to write that the fatigue of the pilot caused the crash. ok fine if the pilot was tired so was the co-pilot also sleepy?? non-sense statements.

ALINA | 14 years ago | Reply There must be some technical fault in that airplane. dont try to make us fool..... he was one of the most experienced pilots ever. it was not his first flight and he was not a kid, obviously his own life was on risk too.

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A Naheed | 14 years ago | Reply Ibrat- A lesson learned: Have our affairs with Allah and Men in order at all times. Exit from this world we must. How? When? Only Allah knows

Muhammad Mustapha | 14 years ago | Reply I feel the black box will never be found now as the facts which would be revealed from it cannot be manipulated locally! I felt there was something fishy going on when senior people came on the media and started to assign blame to the captain after only 2 hours of the crash,without an investigation or facts. Under 3000 feet the pilot gets his bearing from the air traffic controller, although it is his decision to land/not land, his bearing and flight path are given by the air traffic controller as there are also other aircraft’s in the vicinity.That is why a air traffic controller is called a air traffic controller! Its easy to put the blame on a dead captain now as he cannot defend himself! Grow up people and learn to shoulder responsibility!! It could have been your loved ones in that aircraft…

Ayesha | 14 years ago | Reply The pilot was my maternal aunt’s next door neighbour for many many years & was almost like a family to them. I met him & his family on various occasions while visiting my aunt. A very pious & friendly person, and always there for others. He was always the back up pilot, first in PIA & now in Air Blue whenever any pilot failed to show up for duty. Being the person he was, he never refused. Captain Parvez Chaudhry flew a plane from Italy to Karachi, returned home & slept at 3:30am. A call from Air Blue woke him at 5:30am asking him to report as the pilot of the 7:45am flight to Islamabad hadn’t reported on duty so he should come. He left despite not being on original duty. Captain Chaudhry I am sure would not have risked so many lives on purpose. I know of pilots who say he was one of the most professional pilots and the best instructor they ever had. It is wrong to just blame him. Agreed that indeed Captain Chaudhry was fatigued, but he had flown planes under fatigue on numerous occasions before. What about the pilot who did not show up for duty? Is he not partly responsible for forcing a fatigued pilot to fly a plane just because he did not show up? Is Air Blue also not responsible to wake up a fatigued pilot & ask him to show up at an hour’s notice for duty? Couldn’t Air Blue have called up another back up pilot who was not fatigued? And it is high time that such God-fearing and always-there-for-the-others souls learn to say no to airlines. That is the only way that airlines & pilots not showing up for duty realise the height of responsibility managing crew and flying airplanes is. And the amount of lives that are at stake when they are irresponsible. Indeed it is an extremely regrettable loss of lives and I knew some of the passengers directly and indirectly - my seniors and juniors at school and university. And yes, investigations should be done in a transparent manner and lessons learnt for the future. It is wrong to blame just one person. Maybe there was a sudden technical fault which incapacitated the Captain & First Officer. If the pilot was trying to land and didn't see the hills, the First Officer was there in the cockpit too. It is always a chain of events in air crashes in today's hi-tech world. It is not just a single human error.

anwar | 14 years ago | Reply The administrative structure of the airline should be investigated by CAA. If the top management is absent from the base ,there is bound to be loose control in the middle management. The investigation team should also look into this aspect.

saba khalil | 14 years ago | Reply Agree with you Mariam why are we blaming the pilot only?I agree that age does matter and so is the bad weather conditions but above all there is Fate too which can not ignore. But yes, we cant avoid the negligence too that may be because of the aviation department or may be there was some technical defaults in the plane too. As all we know that CIA and Air Blue would never come up with the real facts so in my opinion its not nice to blame the pilot for this misery. Just put yourself in the Pilot's shoe and imagine then you will realize that how hard is to see death just close to you and you cant do anything for your self and more importantly for the other lives with you. Everyone wants to fight with death because everyone wants to live and so was the pilot. Imagine the pain of his family what they will think if they go through from such kind of views? Everyone wants to die with respect. Pray for the departed soul and those who died with him. Ameen.

John Donne | 14 years ago | Reply And what about prayers for salvation of those who moved to eternity? I see none doing it except Sheeba. May Allah cause them to rest in peace. 'Inna lil'lahe wa inna aleyhe rajeoon'.

Mariam | 14 years ago | Reply A catastrophic incident has happened in our country. Hundreds of people have passed away, husbands,brothers,sisters,daughters,sons,mothers have all lost their lives. Families are grieving, parents are wailing for their children and vice versa , yet what most of the talk on every blog/news channel/ talk shows is who do we blame, which one person should carry this horrible claim of killing 152 lives. And blaming the pilot is one of the most cruel blames I've ever heard of. Was he not a father, a husband, did he not want to live?Do you actually think he would be so careless with not only 152 lives but also his. Yes he was old, he had 35 years of experience, is that not worth anything. Stop trying so hard to find a culprit, let the investigations finish,( however,they are,properly done or not) let some time pass before you brandish him as the one responsible for the tragedy. It was unfortunately written in his fate to be the one flying the plane which would end up taking away so many loved ones, he did not do it on purpose. He was not a terrorist who wanted to take a plane full of people down with him. Let's just wait for CIA and Air Blue to come up with official statements. I strongly urge everyone not to start pin pointing so quickly. Yes we all want the reasons to this tragedy so we can prevent such cases in the future but let's not get ahead of us. Whatever happens, happens for a reason.

Rafiq Ahmed | 14 years ago | Reply Why bring religion in human error? Keep religion out from discussion otherwise you will not be able to analyze anything logically. Pilot was a bearded guy & diabetic & if he was fasting, he was playing with the lives of more than 150 innocent people. Sadaf, where you saw Mehraab on the Pilot's face? Please get real!

Sania | 14 years ago | Reply Its definetly a very sad incident...and May Allah forgive all those who died in this tragedy... pakistan is going through hell of problems....This is all a result of our deeds.. INjustice is the biggest cause of all problems......and every one is responsible for that...from corrupt government that we have to the people who elected these corrupts...

SadafFayyaz | 14 years ago | Reply One more thing....There was Shab barat one night before and most people were fasting that day,...I see a Mehraab on pilot;s face.....He was diabetic and may be fasting...during the flight....If sugar level goes down in blood, reflex power becomes slow and brain responds slowly to actions.....Just a perception.....

John Donne | 14 years ago | Reply Rubina,I believe you got it right, and Sheeba, you got it wrong. Talking about fortune, none has been able to decipher the mystery; many no more than speculations. An eminent scholar, Al Ghazzali, whose name even many 'educated' Muslims don't know, had observed, "The Qur'an is purely Divine. Its understanding purely human". Scholars who with sincerity and devotion, spend whole lifes, can't fathom its understanding, much less the depth. And here are you, me and many, not even acquainted with the basics of the Qur'an, passing 'fatwas' on topic like Fortune!

anwar | 14 years ago | Reply What moeration? These are facts which have brought this tragedy

anwar | 14 years ago | Reply THE ABSENTEE LANDLORDS What a disgrace.Not a word from chairman, managtng director or COO OF Airblue about this tragedy about which the world leaders have spoken. The CHAIRMAN LIVES IN Losangles and manages the airline on his Laptop. The managing director lives in toronto and visits once in three months. The CCO is gallavanting all around the world and when in Pakistan is busy in his political affairs. This should be investigated by the Govt . Please put this on your TV channel.

Rubina | 14 years ago | Reply Allah says in the Quran , every good things happen to you from me All the bad stuff happens to our mistakes ! The pilot should not have been flying at 65 with medical problems The airline should not hire near death pilots

a | 14 years ago | Reply This crash was not necessarily a natural disaster. if it was due to the pilot's fatigue it was a completely preventable tragedy which struck a blow to the lives and families of a hundred people. it is very very tragic that the lives of people are so carelessly disregarded in our country and the results blamed on fate

Kashif Chaudhry | 14 years ago | Reply @ Sheeba "AS being Muslims we should believe at fortune" This does not mean we stop investigating. And I do not understand how natural disasters can be prevented but not stopped. If you can prevent a crash, you've actually stopped it! We should study this crash and employ means to prevent further aviation disasters of the sort. May God help us, amen.

sheeba | 14 years ago | Reply natural disasters can be prevent but never stopped......AS being Muslims we should believe at fortune.unbelievable that a 35 year experienced pilot can have this BLUNDER. Every thing happens it it has to INALILLAH-HI WA INA ILAYHI RAJIOON. Allah Tallah inn sab logon ki magfirat fermayy...AMEEN!

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