Safety first

The news that the captain of a PIA Airbus-310 was able to land the plane safely after one of its engines caught fire is obviously excellent news. The incident took place about 15 minutes after the flight — carrying some 54 passengers — took off from Karachi for Dubai. The actions by the pilot saved a potential disaster, with the sight of an aircraft in flames having created some panic in Karachi on the evening of October 6. But what happened also raises questions as to whether we are living too unsafely in the skies and whether enough precautions are in place to prevent possible disaster.

Other incidents, of course, come to mind. The worst of these in our aviation history was the July 2010 crash of an Air Blue flight into the Margalla Hills, killing all 152 people on board. Pilot error has been blamed for this disaster; insinuations that Air Traffic Control at Islamabad did not act swiftly enough to prevent the crash have been made — but perhaps, not examined seriously enough given that errors of judgment of this kind could have serious implications for the future as well. There have also been other occasional reports of problems developing in aircraft, leading to flights being delayed or cancelled.

All this is important in the backdrop of concerns raised about declining standards at PIA, poor maintenance and a dismal financial situation. PIA has in the past mentioned its concerns with meeting the high repair costs of the A-310s. The situation at the smaller, private airlines is not necessarily any better. Perhaps, the alarm bells should be ringing a little louder than is currently the case. Given the human lives involved, it is essential we do everything possible to avoid calamity. Good handling and quite possibly, an element of luck, saved us from one this time. We may not be quite so fortunate next time round and it is imperative the safety situation be examined so that everything humanly possible can be done to keep our airways free of peril.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 8^th, 2013.

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