Pilots on festive-season high get grounded

New Delhi: This New Year eve, some airline pilots and cabin crew members seem to have got a bit too high. In Mumbai alone over the past three days, pre-flight medical tests showed five cockpit and cabin crew members had reported for duty drunk.
What's more, at least four pilots came to the Chhatrapati Shivaji airport for operating flights but fled when they got to know that strict alcohol tests were being conducted. And one pilot was reportedly able to dodge medical examiners and slip into the cockpit to fly out!
Countrywide breath-analyser tests for pilots and cabin crew were ordered by Directorate General of Civil Aviation chief Kanu Gohain last week, in view of the New Year festivities.
While similar tests conducted on 2007 eve across India had found only two drunken pilots in Chennai, by Monday evening this year, only reports from Mumbai had come in — and they showed five positive and an equal number of borderline cases. Reports from other centres are expected shortly.
01/01/08 Saurabh Sinha/Times of India

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Categories: Airports Jan 2008, Safety Jan 2008