KATHMANDU, AUG 25 -
The overcast morning on Tuesday, amidst pouring monsoon with hills around the Valley covered up from top to toe, made me feel that it was perhaps a bad day for flying. It was on a similar sort of day that the RA Dakota (9N-AAH) went missing on Aug. 1, 1962, and later two horrendous crashes — of TG-311 and PK-268 — took place in 1992. The latter are two worst crashes in Nepal’s aviation history. Tuesday morning was that kind of a day, a true Sawaney jhari with incessant rains.
It was after about 7.30 a.m. that I got a text message from another aviation buff who informed me that “Hotel Echo” (9N-AHE) had gone missing! Even he spoke of getting the same kind of eerie feeling (that I had that morning). We right away deduced that it was only a question of time before the crash would be confirmed. In next few minutes he texted the unbelievable news that the Dornier was, in fact, heading towards Kathmandu! Both of us were elated for being wrong. But the mood suddenly swung to the other extreme on hearing live FM coverage from Makwanpur that an aircraft had just crashed there! Wednesday’s papers are awash with the crash news as was the BBC Nepali programme last night.
As usual, an investigation team has been formed and it will present its report in due course of time. And as usual, it will all be forgotten in due course of time. And the cycle will invariably follow. It is my firm belief that such investigations are inherently incomplete not for any other reason but for the absence of the “first party,” who are killed in these crashes.
The crash of a Twin Otter at Lukla last year was miraculous in the sense that the only survivor was the Captain of the flight himself! But did the investigation produce any new findings? We do not know as it is not in CAAN’s tradition to make the full findings public save for a condensed one-page summary with very general sort of recommendations.
I had suggested a few months ago that “the report could have earned a landmark status by making private airlines operate more responsively if it had exposed such (nefarious) alliances” (TKP 05/04/2010).
Most news reports have blamed the weather for yesterday’s crash but the most crucial factor is this: The Captain had informed the tower that he had lost the generator. It looks rather strange that both the generators had failed simultaneously. Having lost all cockpit-based navigation, the aircraft was flying in the blind. On a clear day, he could have still made it down safely to Simra, the nearest airport. As the crash site picture shows a crater, it implies the vertical impact was huge and the aircraft debris was not recognisable. It appears even the engines gave way in the end. It points to a serious maintenance related issue.
It is obvious that private airlines are cutting corners, at the cost of safety. The aviation regulating agency is not incapable but perhaps unwilling to stop the “common rot” that has set in there as well. After all, why should it be any different from any other institutions in the country? Sadly, the “rot” has engulfed all strata right from the political level to the lowest rung of bureaucracy and even the private business. A common saying in the aviation circle is “A Good Pilot is a Dead Pilot.” One can’t be optimistic in such a beak scenario, can we?
(Arjyal, a Post columnist, has written extensively on aviation)
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