ENS

Bangalore, Mar 13: The Bangalore International Airport Limited (BIAL) may be firm on starting operations at its new Bengaluru International Airport (BIA) on March 30.

But it cannot do it without compromising safety of passengers. For, crucial procedures that take about a month to ensure the safety of flights while landing or taking off from the new airport, have not yet been carried out.

Shockingly, the aircraft assigned to carry out the calibration tests from March 10 onwards has no pilots available for it to bring the the Airports Authority of India’s (AAI) calibration team from New Delhi.

Sources told this website's newspaper that this team was expected to carry special calibration equipment onboard the flight to test the strength, accuracy, direction and tallying capacity of radio signals received by pilots comandeering the aircraft, besides testing the reliability of the instrument landing system.

The calibration team tests these parameters from different locations in air within the allocated air space of the BIA to assess the reliability of signals and landing navigational aids.

Aviation experts say this process is an elaborate one. Once DGCA formulates the draft procedures, the AAI calibration team carries out the tests. On studying the report submitted by the calibration team, DGCA allows select pilots belonging to leading airlines to conduct the same.

The pilots separately submit reports to the DGCA, which studies them. Only on DGCA’s approval of these secondary reports are they included in the AIRAC, the air safety parameters of a new aeronautic establishment, before a Notice to Airmen is issued through the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO), headquartered in Montreal.

The AIRAC-NOTAM is a mandatory notice issued to the global aviation community to inform about the safety of any new airport. The information includes a variety of aeronautical parameters including the radio signals and the electronic landing system navigation.

If this process starts any time now, it can be completed by mid-April so that at least by May first week, BIA can be declared safely operational," said an expert, requesting anonymity. There is no indication on when this procedure would begin. AAI officials refused to comment.