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Kathmandu, July 9. A Sourya Airlines plane travelling from Tribhuvan International Airport to Pokhara suffered a serious accident after leaving the runway on Wednesday morning. All 18 people were killed except Captain Manish Shakya. Shakya survived and was taken to hospital.
Within 20 to 22 seconds of flying from the ‘Zirotu’ (Koteshwar side) to the ‘Tujiro’ (Buddhist side) of the Tribhuvan Airport runway, the aircraft crashed into the right side area of the runway and soon after caught fire and was nearly destroyed.
The fact is that the Sourya ship was neither carrying passengers as per the normal flight schedule nor was it a passenger charter flight.
So the question that arises here is if there were no scheduled or chartered flights then why was the ship carrying so many people apart from the crew (Captain and First Officer) and technical personnel?
The ship’s owner, Sourya Airlines, has said that “the ship will go to Pokhara for a ‘C-Check’, which means a comprehensive repair.”
The question still remains – “And why would an unrelated person, other than a technician, be on board a boat going to C-Check?”
According to aviation regulations, no one except technicians is allowed to board the aircraft for maintenance.
In particular, Solar Air made a mistake at the beginning by letting unrelated people on board. However, the aviation regulator, the Nepal Civil Aviation Authority, also ignored Suriya’s mistake, resulting in such a huge loss of life.
Aviation experts said that the regulator should have conducted an “inspection” to see who was on the aircraft under maintenance. However, when the regulators were not paying attention, the terrible accident happened. Even if they paid attention at that time, the accident would not have happened, let alone such a huge number of casualties.
“We allowed the Surya Airlines plane to be ‘ferryed’ to C-Check,” Gyanendra Bhul, information officer at the country’s aviation sector regulator, told Habar Online.
According to Bull, flying a ship to be repaired is called a “ferry flight.” In such flights, except for the captain, co-pilot (crew) and necessary technicians (engineers), no other passengers may be retained except two to three people.
According to authorities, the Sourya vessel, registered as 9N-AME, has no technical problems and is seaworthy until 2025 with 119 flight hours.
In addition, Solar Air is a company with an “MRO” license that allows it to repair its own aircraft. MRO stands for “Maintenance, Repair, Overhaul.”
Any ship should undergo C check after 5,000 hours of flight. To do this, you must fly to the relevant location. Unrelated personnel are not allowed to board the flight by cutting or refunding tickets.
The agency’s information officer Bull said, “Now, we will not ask who will board the flight except those specified as per the rules as there is no need to ask about something that is not stipulated in the rules.” The investigation committee will now investigate whether it was necessary to take the flight.
Yagya Prasad Gautam, former director general of the bureau and former deputy in the tourism ministry, said there was a rule that only senior crew members and technicians could take ferry flights to repair the ship.
“There are multiple parties involved in the Surya boat accident. Flying with an unrelated person besides the crew and technical team is gross negligence,” Gautam said. “How did the authorities give permission? How did Saurya take a ride with an unrelated person? The inquiry committee will definitely look into all such issues.”
A senior captain with 20 years of flying experience said that both Solar Air and the authorities made the same mistake in this air crash.
There are rules for the captain and co-pilot (cockpit crew) and a maximum of three to four flight engineers on board the flight. There are no rules for stewardesses or cabin crew (cabin crew) on such flights.
“The battalion should not have participated in the flight except for the crew and the technical team,” the captain said, without mentioning his own name. The mistake of the authorities was even more so, not even a single check before such a flight. The investigation committee should investigate both of them.
The Sourya was due to sail to Pokhara on Wednesday morning and remain there for a month for repairs.
“It seems that even Soorya employees were told that the plane would be empty or would be diverted to Pokhara, but it is clear that Soorya Airlines committed serious negligence by placing an unrelated person on the plane,” said the captain, who was about to repair the plane.
The captain said he had taken such ferries many times before without any extraneous personnel other than the crew and two or three engineers, which he said was a direct violation of aviation rules.
“There’s no way 19 ships are going to one ship that’s being repaired,” he said.
Another former aviation regulator chief also said it was a serious oversight to have so many people on board a plane being used for maintenance.
“Such a huge loss of life has occurred due to the negligence of the airlines and regulators concerned,” he said.
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