DGCA flags 51 safety lapses in Air India's annual audit report

Air India

Aviation regulator Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) found 51 safety lapses at Air India in its July audit, reports news agency Reuters citing a report it accessed.

The lapses includes lack of sufficient training for some pilots, using unapproved simulators and a bad rostering system.

The audit report flags seven "Level I" significant breaches which need to be fixed by July 30, and 44 other non-compliances that needs to fixed by August 23.

"Recurrent training gaps" were reported for some unspecified Boeing 787 and 777 pilots, stating they did not complete their monitoring duties, in which they don't fly but observe functioning of instruments in the cockpit.

Officials in the report mentioned that Air India did not do "proper route assessments" for some so-called Category C airports, which may have challenging layouts or terrain,  and conducted training for such airfields with simulators that did not meet qualification standards.

"This may account to non-consideration of safety risks during approaches to challenging airports," the DGCA audit report said.

However, this annual audit was not related to the Boeing 787 crash happened in June in Ahmedabad.

The airline is currently facing warning notices for operating aircrafts without checking emergency equipment, not replacing engine parts in time, manipulating records, and other lapses related to crew fatigue management.

Air India's fleet includes 34 Boeing 787s and 23 Boeing 777s, according to Flightradar24 website.

The airline, in its response, said it was "fully transparent" during the audit and will "submit our response to the regulator within the stipulated time frame, along with the details of the corrective actions."

Earlier, an initial report into the crash of Flight AI171 found that the fuel control switches were flipped almost simultaneously after takeoff.

The DGCA has often flagged concerns about Air India pilots breaching the limits of their flight-duty periods. The audit was conducted by 10 DGCA inspectors, and included another four auditors.

The reports also slammed the airline's rostering system, which it said "doesn't give a hard alert" if a minimum number of crew members were not being deployed on a flight, adding that at least four international flights had flown with insufficient cabin crew.