Troubled Shaheen: Fuel tank leakage delays flight for five hours

Engines abruptly stalled as the plane started to take off.

RAWALPINDI:

In yet another air travel hiccup, a Shaheen Airline flight was delayed on Saturday after a leakage was identified in the fuel tank of the aircraft.

The Karachi-bound flight, NL-122, was delayed for over five hours at the Benazir International Airport after passengers were handed boarding passes and asked to board the plane at 10 am. However, the engines abruptly stalled when the plane started to take-off.

Passengers were then asked to step off the aircraft and were told that a technical problem had been identified, a businessman from Haripur who was on board the aircraft said.

After a couple of hours, the passengers waiting in the departure lounge were told there was a leakage in the fuel tank and that it had been repaired.

Irked at the information, the passengers, including 12 children, protested in the departure lounge.

The flight finally took off at 3:30 pm.

Shaheen Airlines’ officials confirmed that the delay was due to a leakage in the fuel tank, adding that it was repaired and the flight left safely for its destination.

Troubled airline

The CAA had recently ordered safety inspections of all airplanes operated by private airlines following the Bhoja Air crash last month to determine whether they were safe to fly but Saturday’s leakage cast doubts over how well the job was done.

According to sources, the plane had undergone a full maintenance check, yet the leakage had not been discovered.

Last month, shortly after the Bhoja Air crash, the fuel tank of another Shaheen Air plane began leaking as the aircraft was about to take off from Lahore airport. The same day, emergency was declared in an aircraft of Shaheen Air when its tyre burst during landing in Karachi.

(with additional reporting by Qamar Zaman)

Published in The Express Tribune, May 20^th, 2012.