Sunday, 13 Oct, 2024
The low cost carrier has been facing a slew of issues concerning aircraft maintenance in the recent past
On Tuesday, a Delhi-Dubai Spicejet flight had to make an emergency landing in Karachi, Pakistan after developing a technical fault. This was the second incident involving a SpiceJet aircraft in a day. Earlier in the day, the outer pane of the cockpit windshield of Kandla-Mumbai flight cracked mid-air forcing the pilots to carry out priority landing in Mumbai.
The low cost carrier has been facing a slew of issues concerning aircraft maintenance in the recent past. There have been at least 15 air-safety incidents involving SpiceJet that were reported in the past 10 months. The third largest carrier in the country after Indigo and Air India, Spicejet flies on 250 routes, including 38 international ones, has 214 daily passenger flights, 145 cargo destinations (including 93 international) and possesses a fleet size of almost 100 airplanes. Yet it is not best known for its safety.
And, it’s not just safety either. In the month of May, SpiceJet came in second in terms of flight cancellations, according to a report by regulator Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA). Overall, around 550 passenger complaints were registered against domestic airlines, out of which 0.8 per 10,000 passengers were against Spicejet.
With the aviation industry trying to get back on its feet post the pandemic, they have been found to be compromising on passenger safety as well as comfort. According to experts, lack of trained commercial pilots, shortage of ground staff, salary cuts and airlines going for cost cutting amid huge financial losses has led to a huge neglect in aviation safety. The increasing cases has now promoted Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) in April 2022 laid down roles and responsibilities for airlines as part of its surveillance programme to strengthen flight safety. It made the airlines mandatory to fill the deficiency reporting form that would explain the issue and specify the reference of the regulatory provision against which the observation was made. Any significant non–compliance of safety standards identified during surveillance inspection, spot checks or safety audits should be addressed immediately and intimated to the DGCA
Although the number of such incidents has been on a rise, Indian skies can still be considered safe when compared to rest of the world. India's accident rate per million departures is far less than world accident rate.
According to DGCA data, since Independence 2,173 people have died in 52 commercial passenger airline accidents that have had at least one fatality. Of these, an overwhelming 1,740 people, or 80 per cent, died in mishaps that were attributed to pilot error. Pilot error was also found to be the cause in eight of India’s 10 most fatal air crashes that together claimed 1,352 lives.
The number of mishaps is also declining. While in the 1991-2000 decade, 552 people were killed in seven fatal clashes, the 2001-2010 decade saw just one, the Air India Express crash in Mangaluru in 2010. Last decade also saw only a single incident [the Kozhikode air crash of August 2020].
