Tag Archives: DGCA

In most countries across the world, especially in North America and Western Europe, the use of mobile phones is permitted soon after the aircraft lands and exits the active runway. In India, many a passenger broke current rules by following this practice. No longer. India’s Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) is finally bringing Indian carriers in line with these …

As per a release by the Press Information Bureau, Govt. of India, following is the full text of the Statement by Shri Praful Patel, Minister of Civil Aviation in the Rajya Sabha on August 3rd, in response to the Calling Attention Motion tabled by Shri P. Rajeeve, MP, Rajya Sabha regarding “Serious safety problems faced by airline industry in the …

On October 21, 2009, India’s Directorate General of Civil Aviation issued Air Transport Circular 10 of 2009 which outlined a series of steps meant to ease congestion of flights at Indian airport, most particularly Mumbai and Delhi. One of the steps outlined required for the commander of a domestic flight to call for ATC clearance delivery within 45 minutes to …

Ever since the unfortunate crash of Air India Express’ Boeing 737-800 VT-AXV at Mangalore Bajpe, I have been inundated by requests across the world to comment and even speculate about the crash and possible causes. Over the last few days we see all kinds of high energy stories in the media, be it speculating on reasons for the crash, or …

An Emirates airline Boeing 777-21H registration A6-EML performing flight EK530 from Dubai, United Arab Emirates (DXB) to Kochi, India (COK) with 350 passengers and 14 crew, was en-route at FL350 (35,000ft) and just about to begin descent towards Kochi, when the airplane experienced severe turbulence for a brief period of time. As per a statement released by the airline, the …

Two weeks ago, India’s Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) issued a circular changed the low visibility take-off (LVTO) minima for Category C aircraft (Airbus A320 family, Boeing 737 family) to 150 metres for all airlines from the New Delhi IGI airport. While the DGCA claims this move would not affect air safety, the circular has sparked an intense debate …

A Kingfisher Airlines Aerospatiale ATR-72-500, registration VT-KAC performing flight IT-4124 from Bhavnagar skidded off the runway and crashed at Mumbai’s Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport (CSIA) at 16:40 local (11:10Z). 42 passengers and 4 crew were evacuated safely, no injuries occurred to the passengers and crew. It appears the plane overran the runway, skidded and came to rest on soft ground …

A herculean effort mounted by Secretary Civil Aviation Nambiar and Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) chief Nasim Zaidi helped India pass the International Aviation Safety Assessment (IASA) program audit of the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). During its 2006 audits, the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) had found several violations of 300 guidelines. Shortage of skilled manpower was the …

Within the weekend the threatened strike action by the Federation of Indian Airlines (FIA) on August 18th has fizzled out. On Friday July 31, the FIA members barring state owned Air India, took India by storm and announced they would suspend all domestic flights on August 18th in protest of the vindictive tax policies on the aviation industry specifically aviation …

The Joint Investigation team constituted on February 19, 2009 to investigate the serious incident of a near miss between the Presidential Indian Air Force (IAF) helicopter and a Air India flight IC-866 on February 9, 2009 at Mumbai airport has submitted it report to the Ministry of Civil Aviation. To translate the official findings (shown below), the Presidential formation called …

Brazil’s navy recovered a large part of F-GZCP’s vertical stabiliser better known as the rudder, yesterday. The New York Times reports, the part, bearing the trademark stripes and logo of Air France, bore no evident burn marks and had retained its triangular shape, save for a missing chunk where it appeared to have been torn from the body of the …

Mumbai airport is in the news again and not for any right reason. After a near fiasco with the presidential helicopter less than three months ago, a major disaster was averted at Mumbai airport on the same day that Mumbai airport has commenced 24 hour cross runway operations. An Air India Airbus A310-300, flight AI-348 from Mumbai to Delhi, India …

Airlines flouting rules relating to safety and passenger comfort will now have to pay higher penalties with new laws coming into effect. The penalties will be imposed on an airlines if it violates safety aspects like airworthiness of the aircraft, security and issues relating to passenger comfort. The rules raise the penalty limit from Rs 1,000 to up to Rs …

Dashing the hopes of many domestic airlines who are desperate for foreign airline investments, the Government of India has put in to effect new rules governing the investments and operations of scheduled airlines which include fixing minimum levels of equity and barring any investment by foreign carriers. The rules, which were approved a few months ago, were incorporated recently into …

A Kingfisher Airlines Airbus A320-232 VT-KFT performing flight IT 432 from Kolkata to Bangalore via Hyderabad veered and skidded off the runway at Bengaluru International Airport (BIA) due to rain and high winds. There were 138 passengers including crew on board at the time of the incident, which happened at 21:35 hrs (16:05Z) yesterday. An airline source informed PTI “The …

An audit team of the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is meeting the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) in Delhi today. The team will check if India is following the international safety standards set by the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) under the FAA’s International Aviation Safety Assessment (IASA) Program. During its 2006 audits, ICAO had found several violations …

Read the official investigation report here. February 9, 2009, 10:00 IST (04:30 GMT) TV channels are reporting that an Air India Airbus A321 performing flight IC866 was involved in a rejected take-off/near miss at Mumbai Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport earlier this morning. The flight had commenced its take-off run, when a helicopter which was given permission to land, strayed across …

The US aviation regulator, Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), has delayed permission to a code-sharing agreement between Jet Airways (India) Ltd and United Air Lines Inc., as per the Mint. The code share agreement would have given Jet Airways passengers access to United’s five hubs of Chicago, Denver, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Washington, and access to 20 other cities across …

My post The world’s most delayed and most punctual airports, seems to have ignited a media frenzy within India. Times of India carried snippets from the article Sunday 11th January, which became a national story, and was picked up later that morning by the TV networks. A lot of Bangalore Aviation readers have been asking me questions relating to the …

Travel trade associations skeptical of airlines implementing the directiveBy Krupa Vora | Mumbai The much-debated issue of refund of airline tickets has been now brought to the forefront by the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) by issuing a Civil Aviation Requirement (CAR) letter to the airlines. As per this CAR dated May 22, 2008 all scheduled and non-scheduled carriers …