NEW DELHI, Nov 5:
Concerned over more than 60 air crashes in the last five years, Defence Minister A K Antony today asked IAF to quickly complete all its pending Courts of Inquiry (CoIs) to bring down the number of such accidents.
“Antony asked the IAF to complete all pending CoI proceedings into air accidents as early as possible and take appropriate remedial measures so that the possibility of future accidents are minimised,” the Defence Ministry said.
“Even one accident is a matter of serious concern,” the Minister told the Consultative Committee of the Defence Ministry on flight safety in IAF.
It is learnt the IAF told the meeting that a total of 63 category I air crashes have taken place in the last five years of which a majority are fighter aircraft and CoIs in some of them were pending.
On the flight safety in IAF chopper fleet, Antony said a one-time inspection of all helicopter detachments was carried out due to the fact that a high number of accidents on helicopters occur when they are away from their parent base.
“These inspections resulted in highlighting several shortcomings and action is being taken on a priority basis,” the Defence Minister said.
The IAF also informed the meeting that there was “reducing trend” in the number of flying hours registered by the force in the last few years due to phasing out of the older aircraft such as MiG 21 and MiG 27.
The panel was informed that the Rs 3,000 crore Kaveri aircraft engine being developed by the DRDO for the indigenous Light Combat Aircraft (LCA) would not be used for the project.
The Kaveri engine is undergoing testing at the moment and is expected to be used by the research organisation for its futuristic prgrammes such as the fifth generation Advanced Medium Combat Aircraft (AMCA).
The Defence Minister said that a joint committee comprising representatives of Defence Ministry, IAF, HAL and DRDO has been constituted to monitor the implementation of the recommendations of the CoIs for air crashes.
He said the period from 2001-2013 are being marked as the ‘Period of Maintenance and Consolidation’ in the force.
The Defence Ministry is also planning to phase out equipment approaching redundancy and certain critical procurements have been fast-tracked, he said.
“Non-upgraded MiG-27 and MiG-21 are being phased out progressively by March 2016 and March 2018 respectively,” he said.
To a query on the shortage of spare parts, Antony said earlier the acquisition of aircraft and replenishment of spare parts used to be dealt with by separate contracts.
“In the new contracts we are taking corrective measures and product support is built into the process of acquisition of new aircraft,” he said.
On the need to improve training facilities in the force, Antony said deficiencies in training are being rectified by a review of training patterns, enhancement of availability of training aircraft and strengthening of training procedures.
“Procurement of 75 Basic Trainer Aircraft has been fast-tracked and the first training course on the new trainer aircraft ‘Pilatus’ will commence in July 2013,” he said.
At the meeting, some of the members raised questions about the technology of the Pilatus trainer aircraft and whether it would be able to train IAF trainee pilots for flying sophisticated aircraft such as the Rafale.
Of the 22 members, ten MPs who attended the meeting included Naveen Jindal, Suresh Kalmadi, Harshvardhan, Kailkesh N Singh Deo, Lalit Mohan Suklabaidya, Gopal Singh Shekhawat, Ram Chandra Khuntia, Veer Singh, HK Dua and Piyush Goyal. (PTI)
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