The Directorate General of Civil Aviation has rolled out a surveillance mechanism to identify non–compliance of flight safety standards and alert the authorities concerned for taking urgent corrective action to resolve the deficiencies.
The comprehensive surveillance programme involving experts drawn from stakeholders like scheduled airlines, non–scheduled operators, aircraft maintenance organisations, design and manufacturing organisations and flying training institutes among others would cover all areas of activities under the DGCA’s regulatory control. These guidelines first issued in 2009 were revised and re–issued on Friday.
The primary focus of the initiative is to find any significant non–compliance with the applicable requirement which lowers the safety standard and affects seriously the flight safety. Such deficiencies would be conveyed in a standardised “Deficiency Reporting Form” that would explain the issue and specify the reference of the regulatory provision against which the observation was made.
The airline or agency concerned would respond promptly by providing a solution to rectify the systemic deficiency to preclude recurrence of similar observations. “The corrective action plan, which only removes and resolves the immediate concern without rectifying the system, shall not be accepted as a satisfactory permanent resolution,” the aviation watchdog said in a circular.
Timebound resolution
Any significant non–compliance of safety standards identified during surveillance inspection, spot checks or safety audits should be addressed immediately and intimated to the DGCA. In case organisations were not in a position to implement corrective measures within the specified timeframe of 30 days for justified reasons, the DGCA at its discretion may grant a further 15 days.
“Where no reasonable and justified reasons are assigned for non–implementation of the corrective action plan within the time–frame agreed upon with the DGCA office, necessary enforcement action will be initiated against the organisation or the person responsible for non–compliance as the case may be,” the circular said.
