Press Release of Tourism Ministry; probe on series of tyre burst incidents
One after another incidents of tyre burst of National Flag Carrier Nepal Airlines Corporation Airbus 320 aircraft can be either all a coincidence or a serious mistake of somebody, somewhere inside not witnessed by general.
Ministry of Culture, Tourism and Aviation (MOCTA) that also has witnessed these incidents and should be responsible for any mishap if occurs has accordingly forwarded a decision to make an inspection on those events to highlight the truth out and to punish anyone if found to be guilty or involved at any part in occurrence of the series of same kind of incidents.
MOCTA has made a press release regarding this matter of concern and constituted an investigation body to make all the necessary investigations and release the truth out, also to recommend to punish if anyone is found guilty or careless and to include a final report which may suggest the amendments of corrections in system to avoid the similar kind of incidents in near future within 15 days.
The investigation body will be leaded by Mr. Suresh Acharya, Joint Secretary of MOCTA, followed by the a team as follows:
Mr. Binod Kumar Gautam, Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal – Member
Capt. Deepak Lama, Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal – Member
Capt. Biswoman Amatya, Safety Consultant, Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal – Member
Er. Samir Basnet, Himalaya Airlines Pvt. Ltd – Member
Senior Airworthiness Er. Ritesh Panta, Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal – Secretary Member
The press release illustrated the two incidents of emergency landing of Airbus Sagarmatha 9N-AKW in Delhi Airport after takeoff due to flaps malfunction which was later identified as a tyre burst consequence and the yesterday’s tyre burst incident of another aircraft of same series 9N-AKX Lumbini at Tribhuvan International Airport after the landing roll while entering the taxi way.
The burst of tyre in TIA made the aircraft uncontrollable while entering the taxiway and the aircraft had to be evacuated right in the taxiway Alpha near runway and its part caused a slight damage to the runway. The aircraft was later towed to its hangar by a tractor.
The same aircraft had a tyre burst incident just 15 days before while landing at TIA. The flight was outbound from Hong Kong and tyre burst was identified only after the aircraft arrived hangar.
The runway there after had to be shut for around an hour due to which a lot of flights were affected. Biman Bangladesh flight outbound from Dhaka, Air Arabia flight outbound from Sarjaha was diverted to Lukhnow, India. Druk Air outbound from Bhutan and Air indigo outbound from India were put on holding in air. Similarly, the in domestic flights two aircraft of Tara Air were diverted to Simara, one from Buddha Air to Bhairwa and one from yeti Airlines to Biratnagar.
