Smartphonetechie
India’s aviation watchdog has launched an inquiry after reports that a Jet Airways Boing 777 suddenly lost 5,000 feet over Turkey’s airspace. The investigation in what is termed as a “serious incident” according to the Indian aviation is reported to have occurred while the chief pilot was taking a nap and the co-pilot was busy on her tablet.
The plane was en route to Mumbai from Brussels and was carrying 300 passengers. The chief pilot was reportedly taking a “controlled rest” which is allowed for long flights. The co-pilot was apparently too busy on her i-pad to notice that the plane had lost altitude. Because she was busy attending to her electronic flight bag(EFB)-a tablet that has all aircraft documents loaded onto it, she didn’t realize the lose in altitude until a call from a panicked air controller prompted her into waking up the captain. Following this, the plane was brought back into its rightful altitude.
The Turkish airspace is a crowded zone with a number of flights using it as a much safer alternative to passing through Syria, Iraq and Ukraine. As a result of the crowded airspace, air traffic control has been more stringent in terms of aircrafts having to follow their assigned altitudes in order to avoid air-collisions.
The plane did land safely in Mumbai however, since neither the pilot nor the co-pilot bothered to inform the airline or India’s Director General of Civil Aviation, the incident became known to the Director General via an anonymous text message. Instead, they continued flying planes till they were grounded on Tuesday following the anonymous text. The incident itself occurred on Friday.
Investigations are underway to ascertain what exactly happened, whether or not the co-pilot went on a nap herself or a button was accidentally pressed.
Jet Airways has stated that an Internal Inquiry into the matter was underway and issued the following statement:
“Safety is of paramount importance to Jet Airways, as is also the welfare of our guests and crew and the airline will always take appropriate steps to ensure the same.”
An audit into Jet Airways’ training procedures for pilots is underway according to the Indian aviation watchdog, this in light of the fact that the pilots didn’t file the report of the incident immediately after it happened.
The two pilots, whose names have been withheld, have been suspended pending an investigation.
