GILGIT: The Gilgit-Bal­tistan Supreme Appellate Court (SAC) has directed the Civil Aviation Auth­o­rity (CAA) and Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) to submit a report on the operational life of ATR aircraft on the Gilgit-Islamabad route and the reasons behind technical faults in these flights.

Chief Justice of SAC Sardar Muhammad Shamim Khan issued the directives, while presiding over a suo moto hearing related to PIA’s ATR flights on the Gilgit-Islamabad route.

The people of GB pleaded that the operational life of PIA’s ATR planes had expired, posing an extreme risk, with frequent technical faults causing delays at Gilgit Airport.

They highlighted incidents where CAA had grounded ATR flights, and two ATR aircraft had crashed in hilly areas, resulting in loss of lives.

In September, Chief Justice Shamim Khan took suo moto notice of the case, and in compliance with court orders, PIA’s chief technical officer, chief commercial officer and CAA’s controller (North) appeared before the court on Wednesday.

PIA’s chief technical officer told the court that ATR planes, purchased in 2006, are supposed to complete 70 thousand flight cycles, of which only half have been completed.

Chief Justice Shamim Khan asked, “Then why are technical faults emerging in ATR flights?”

The CAA representative told court that the authority has already prepared a feasibility report for a new airport at Sultanabad area of Gilgit.

Expressing dissatisfaction, Chief Justice Shamim Khan rejected it and ordered a new submission for the next hearing.

Published in Dawn, November 23rd, 2023