In a shocking discovery, a DGCA audit has found that a foreign pilot “with dubious flying credentials”, hired from an aviation consultancy firm, had been recruited without his log record being verified by the previous company in which he had served.
The DGCA also slammed the training in Air India Express, saying that “correct assessments are not being done by the training captains which is later reflecting as an incident/accident”. It also pointed out one case where a pilot’s tendency of a “tail strike” was not paid heed to, resulting in an incident of “tail strike on the aircraft”. The DGCA pointed out that the “flight safety manual (of Air India Express) is still not approved by the DGCA and that the flight safety chief had not obtained DGCA approval. The DGCA also pointed to “lack of sufficient manpower in the flight safety set-up” of Air India Express. In its finding that the airline had violated flight duty time limitation (FDTL) regulations for their pilots (rendering them prone to fatigue), the aviation regulator said, “DGCA dispensation of 33 hours in a week ... for Kerala-Dammam (Gulf) sector as given on February 22, 2011, was misused and was applied in all sectors in contravention to aircraft rules. The operator issued a company advice on April 7, 2011, that DGCA had granted dispensation for Air India Charters Ltd (that runs AI Express) for 33 hours per week instead of 30 hours...,” the DGCA found while auditing AICL in Sept. 2011.