Congestions, near misses endanger air space

New Delhi: Last month, two planes were given take off clearance at the Delhi airport. There are no parallel runways at the airport, they converge after a mile. Both pilots had one mile — a few minutes of flying time — to take evasive action.
This happened not once, but twice in the last two months and aviation experts say both instances were more than dangerous. However, the Director General of Civil Aviation, Kanu Gohain thinks otherwise.
An aircraft takes off or lands every minute at Delhi airport, but infrastructure hasn't kept up.
There is a shortage of trained and experienced controllers. The Government hastily hired 300 Air Traffic Controllers three years ago, but they are still to cut their teeth.
According to an Airport Authority study, Delhi is still short by over 150 experienced officers. Sources at the Airports Authority say high stress is forcing errors.
Frighteningly, errors are sometimes caused by bad communication. Commands have to be repeated due to poor reception on some VHF radio frequencies and crucial time is lost.
Airport employees say standard operation procedures are often complicated and difficult to follow.
25/12/07 Karma Paljor/CNN-IBN

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Categories: Airports Dec 2007, Safety Dec 2007