<div>Mangalore Airport should revamp its meteorological services and the airport runway safety team needs to be more active and effective, an investigation by the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) has said.<br /><br />“The airport is susceptible to frequent weather changes due to its geographical location. The measurement is dependent upon human judgement which may not be accurate and can become a potential safety hazard,” stated the DGCA report made public recently on the hard landing of an Air India flight from Dubai on August 14, 2012. No one was injured in the incident.<br /><br />It said the investigation was conducted not to apportion blame or to assess individual or collective responsibility. The sole objective is to draw lessons from this serious incident, which may help prevent such future accidents or incidents, it added.<br /><br />According to the report, the runway visibility in the airport was “measured manually” as the “modern instrumented RVR system capable of displaying changing visibility is not available” at the Mangalore Airport.<br /><br />The visibility for the period then was reported to be 800 metres, while none of the tower officials was able to sight the aircraft’s landing profile and its exit from Runway 24 after landing presumably due to low visibility, the report said.<br /><br />It noted that the ‘observation post’ of the meteorological office was located far behind the control tower, at a distance of about one kilometre, in the old terminal building. <br /><br />Additional manpower<br />However, additional manpower is posted at the new control tower during bad weather situations to provide spot weather observations.<br /><br />The report also found fault with the flight crew for not reporting the hard-landing incident to the Air Traffic Control in Mangaluru even after switching off the aircraft and seeing the damage to the aircraft and its wheels during post-flight inspection.<br /><br />The investigation team felt that Air India should immediately enhance its crew awareness of hazards of landing under reduced visibility and review its crew training on landing under marginal weather and low visibility conditions.<br /><br />It also wanted appropriate corrective training, as deemed fit, should be planned for the aircraft captain and first officer. Emphasis should be laid on operations in marginal weather conditions. Air India should also ensure prompt reporting of any abnormality noticed by the flight crew, the report noted.<br /><br /></div>
<div>Mangalore Airport should revamp its meteorological services and the airport runway safety team needs to be more active and effective, an investigation by the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) has said.<br /><br />“The airport is susceptible to frequent weather changes due to its geographical location. The measurement is dependent upon human judgement which may not be accurate and can become a potential safety hazard,” stated the DGCA report made public recently on the hard landing of an Air India flight from Dubai on August 14, 2012. No one was injured in the incident.<br /><br />It said the investigation was conducted not to apportion blame or to assess individual or collective responsibility. The sole objective is to draw lessons from this serious incident, which may help prevent such future accidents or incidents, it added.<br /><br />According to the report, the runway visibility in the airport was “measured manually” as the “modern instrumented RVR system capable of displaying changing visibility is not available” at the Mangalore Airport.<br /><br />The visibility for the period then was reported to be 800 metres, while none of the tower officials was able to sight the aircraft’s landing profile and its exit from Runway 24 after landing presumably due to low visibility, the report said.<br /><br />It noted that the ‘observation post’ of the meteorological office was located far behind the control tower, at a distance of about one kilometre, in the old terminal building. <br /><br />Additional manpower<br />However, additional manpower is posted at the new control tower during bad weather situations to provide spot weather observations.<br /><br />The report also found fault with the flight crew for not reporting the hard-landing incident to the Air Traffic Control in Mangaluru even after switching off the aircraft and seeing the damage to the aircraft and its wheels during post-flight inspection.<br /><br />The investigation team felt that Air India should immediately enhance its crew awareness of hazards of landing under reduced visibility and review its crew training on landing under marginal weather and low visibility conditions.<br /><br />It also wanted appropriate corrective training, as deemed fit, should be planned for the aircraft captain and first officer. Emphasis should be laid on operations in marginal weather conditions. Air India should also ensure prompt reporting of any abnormality noticed by the flight crew, the report noted.<br /><br /></div>
