Garuda & instructions...

[Montague S]

Carsten posted in jetspotter that another incident with our Indonesian friends has now been exposed. Its not the PM's job to administer punishment or investigate this incident..but something needs to be done at Garuda.

Garuda almosts land on airport workers. Will Rudd demand answers?

Ben Sandilands writes:

An alarming incident at Perth Airport involving a Garuda Indonesia
737, more than 100 predominantly Australian passengers and a
construction crew working on a closed section of a runway last Friday
has come to light.
The flight from Denpasar was about to land when the pilots queried
why they could see vehicles and machinery at the end of the runway
and began a go-around.
Perth tower is understood to have been doubly surprised.
Not only had Garuda and all other airlines using the airport been
issued with a special notification of the work, which instructed them
to use a displaced threshold, meaning land further down the runway
than normal, but a copy of these instructions had been transmitted to
the flight as it approached Perth.

Make that a triple surprise. The Garuda flight then lined for another
landing on the runway and appeared at imminent risk of touching down
right on top of the work site.

The tower ordered the Indonesians to abort the landing approach and
go around again, but they kept coming, levelling off at the last
moment to skim over the obstacles and then land safely on the
remainder of the runway.

A major investigation has been launched by the Australian Transport
Safety Bureau. It is certain to ask whether or not the original
notification to all pilots was clearly written (which Crikey
understands that it was), whether Garuda’s operations division
actually read and acted upon the notification, whether its pilots
paid any attention to the electronic copy of the notification sent to
their flight, and whether they understood the urgent advice from the
tower to discontinue their landing approach and what factors might
have made them ignore its directive.

This is a serious matter. While the ATSB only deals with the
technical aspects of incidents with a view to furthering aviation
safety, there is a political dimension which PM Rudd, as leader of
the opposition, grasped in the aftermath of the 7 March, 2007
atrocity in which another Garuda 737 crash landed at Yogyakarta
Airport which killed two AFP security officers, two Australian
government employees, one journalist, 17 other passengers and left
dozens injured or crippled among the 118 survivors.

That Garuda jet was still a smoking ruin when Rudd called for
criminal sanctions against the pilots involved, who tried to land it
on a short runway at twice the normal speed.

Subject to the findings of the investigation, what will the PM do
about the antics of Garuda (which is responsible for the competency
of its pilots) at an Australian airport?

Or does being in government make it all too hard to demand answers
and actions?