close
Thursday April 25, 2024

CAA and thecrash report

The CAA has made public its report about the investigation into the April 20, 2012 crash of a private airline’s flight from Karachi to Islamabad that resulted in the deaths of 127 passengers, including the crew. Without going into the merits and demerits of this investigation, one can ask what

By our correspondents
January 31, 2015
The CAA has made public its report about the investigation into the April 20, 2012 crash of a private airline’s flight from Karachi to Islamabad that resulted in the deaths of 127 passengers, including the crew. Without going into the merits and demerits of this investigation, one can ask what remedial steps and punitive action the authority has taken against those responsible for issuing licences, AOC and approving documents related to the company’s financial capacity and infrastructure to meet eventualities such as accidents, etc.
Was it not the legal and moral obligation of the CAA to ensure that the airline in question had sufficient financial resources and insurance cover to compensate victims of an air crash? The CAA report states that the pilot was not trained to handle auto flight instruments installed on B737, forgetting the fact that the authority itself is responsible for issuing licences to pilots, aircraft engineers, etc, and therefore it stands condemned by these lapses. The CAA must also declare what steps it has taken to ensure that no airline operator fails to meet its obligations towards passengers in future. In addition the CAA must ensure that it has the capacity to perform its regulatory functions free from political or petty corporate interests of investors by inbuilt self-auditing to prevent any conflict of interests.
Malik Tariq Ali
Lahore