Lagatar24 Desk
New Delhi, July 29: In response to the frequent technical problems experienced by domestic airlines, Union Minister of Civil Aviation Jyotiraditya Scindia said on Friday that passenger safety is of the utmost priority and that cannot be compromised in any way.
This year, there have been numerous recorded occurrences that have required aeroplanes to land with reduced safety margins or return to their original station.
“We have taken decisive actions, (regulator) DGCA has done spot checks and audits and several actions were taken,” the civil aviation minister said in a briefing.
The minister informed the Lok Sabha in a written reply on Thursday that 478 technical issues in total had been recorded during the course of the previous year, from July 2021 to June 2022.
“These technical snags are reported by the flight crew on receiving an aural/ visual warning in the cockpit or an indication of an inoperative/ faulty system or while experiencing difficulty in handling/operating the aircraft,” added the minister.
Following recent reports of technical issues with several of SpiceJet’s aircraft, the DGCA issued an order on Wednesday requiring the airline to perform no more than 50% of its scheduled flights for eight weeks.
Arun Kumar, director general of the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA), said in an interview with ANI on Thursday that while aircraft systems are fairly reliable and do have several redundancies, component failures do not necessarily suggest that the safety of the passengers is at risk.
