THIS is apropos Ijaz Mir’s letter ‘Fake pilots’ regarding ‘above average, average and below average pilots’ (July 3). He wrote that in most of airlines the sector chief pilot assigns the duties to pilots and he pairs a below average co-pilot with an above average captain and vice versa.

This theory, however, defies all logic. All pilots have to be well above average or above average in their flying skills, physical fitness and mental robustness.

Alongside flying training they study nine subjects such as aviation law, theory of flight, meteorology, engine, navigation etc. For a commercial pilot licence, the passing percentage is 70. So the under training pilots have to be exceptionally good to qualify in the written portion and demonstrate above average skills in flying.

They complete 200 hours which is mandatory to complete their flying training. In the recent PIA’s Airbus crash case, the captain in all probability ignored the instructions of the air traffic controller and was heard saying: “We are comfortable, we will manage it.”

This showed his over confidence having flown 17,000 hours. It is mindboggling that when he was on the final approach the control tower completely failed to notice on his monitor that the landing gear of the aircraft was not fully extended.

Similarly, the captain and the co-pilot failed to see on their monitor the position of the landing gear. The writer philosophically summarised his letter by saying, “when both engines touched the runway, they took off again — a natural reaction as they were not prepared for a belly landing. This damaged both the engines and the result was the plane crashed.”

Here, let me apprise the writer that on Feb 4, 1986, a PIA jumbo jet made a belly landing at Islamabad Airport with 247 passengers and 17 crew members on board. Luckily everyone survived. The accident was caused by pilot error but he did not try to take off again.

He did not reinforce his blunder. Rather he hugged the ground. As regards the statement of the aviation minister that there are 260 pilots in the country who had either fake licences or had cheated in their examinations, this is a bitter reality we should face.

The pilots who are working abroad having fake licences should face the music. It is better they came back and prove the validity of their licences. No damage has been done to Pakistan for telling the truth.

A stitch in time saves nine. The list of air crash owing to human error is long.

A Pakistani
Karachi

Published in Dawn, August 17th, 2020