Saturday Flight Aborted Because Of "Fault"

The latest in the saga of Air India problems occurred Saturday when a Toronto-bound flight from New Delhi was aborted due to a "fault" noticed by the pilot.

According to an AI senior official, the pilot of AI-197 Delhi-Amritsar-Birmingham-Toronto flight noticed a technical fault while touching down at Amritsar airport and decided to return to New Delhi, reported The Hindu.

The official said that some spare-parts were being flown in from Mumbai to repair the aircraft. He said adequate arrangements had been made for the passengers stranded at Amritsar.

CNN-IBN, however, reported that the pilot noticed the fault mid-flight and decided not to operate the aircraft any further. All passengers were offloaded at Amritsar and the aircraft returned to Delhi, where it landed under emergency conditions.

A number of AI planes had technical faults in the recent past, as ANN has reported, including an AI Boeing aircraft bound for Dubai April 21. That plane suffered a technical fault before take-off at the Indira Gandhi International Airport in New Delhi. One April 9, two AI planes made emergency landings within a span of a few hours.

FMI:  www.airindia.com