Fifteen people lost their lives in May in the air crash near Jomsom airport and 19 people including seven Britons and five Chinese were dead in another crash in the month of September.[break]
Nepali aviation experts opine that poor enforcement of safety rules, lack of implementation of recommendations made by air crash probe committees and the difficult terrain are some of the major reasons for air crashes in Nepal
According to the officials of probe committee who are investigating the recent Sita Air plane crash, very few instructions have been followed by the operators and the authorities. Although most air crash reports have ended up blaming pilot error, questions have been raised about aviation safety practices in terms of duty hours, insufficient cockpit resource management and other factors.
The recent development in an effort to improve the air safety includes surprise checking of CAAN (Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal) officials in regional airports of Nepal. “During the surprise visit we ensure that the pilot is properly following safety mechanism, the manual which should be inside the aircraft is in place and the cabin crew is consistent to discipline,” the official said adding they were also ensuring whether devices like cockpit voice recorder are functional or not.
A ministerial level meeting at Ministry of Culture, Tourism and Civil Aviation had instructed the stakeholders to have a review meeting for quality assurance on monthly basis, it has not been implemented so far.
In another effort, MoCTCA is preparing to form an independent air transport safety board. The ministry has already forwarded the proposal to the Ministry of Finance, according to an official of the ministry. The government will appoint members to the board, which will comprise former aviation experts like air traffic controllers, pilots and representatives from airlines operators among others.
A major development in aviation safety this year is an interim safety recommendation prepared by the probe commission. The commission has instructed to review current Flight Operation Requirements (FOR) in domestic sector. Among the various recommendations, a major one includes digitizing the weighing machines and fix a new limit for average weight of passengers.
“At present we consider average weight of female passenger to be 60, male 65 and foreigner at 75,” the official said majority of the countries in Europe were considering the average weight at 90.
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