Go First flight diverted due to windshield crack; third malfunction in two days

A Go First flight heading from Delhi to Guwahati on Wednesday (July 20) was diverted to Jaipur as its windshield cracked mid-way, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) said.

This is the third such incident of technical malfunction reported by the airlines in two days.

On Tuesday, a Go First aircraft heading to Delhi was not able to take off as a dog came running on the runway of Leh airport, the aviation regulator had informed.

The officials from DGCA had called it a routine incident.

On the same day, Go First’s Mumbai-Leh flight and Srinagar-Delhi flight faced engine snags and the two A320neo planes were grounded by the authorities.

The aviation regulator is investigating the incidents and both planes, with Pratt and Whitney engines, will fly only when cleared by it, the officials informed.

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Both aircraft reported faults in engine number two.

While the Mumbai-Leh flight was diverted to Delhi, the Srinagar-Delhi flight returned to Srinagar.

Wednesday’s snag is the latest of the recurring episodes of technical malfunctioning seen in planes operated by Indian carriers since the last month.

Over the last three days, Aviation Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia has held multiple meetings with airlines and officials from his ministry and DGCA officials to ensure safety.

The DGCA on Monday said that it conducted spot checks and found that an insufficient number of engineering personnel were certifying planes of various carriers before take-off.

Before each departure, an aircraft is checked and certified by an aircraft maintenance engineer (AME). The DGCA has now issued guidelines for airlines on the deployment of qualified AME personnel and directed them to comply by July 28.

The spot checks also found that AME teams of airlines were improperly identifying the “cause of a reported defect,” the DGCA order noted.

On July 17, the IndiGo’s Sharjah-Hyderabad flight was diverted to Karachi as a precautionary measure after pilots observed a defect in one engine.

As per reports, the Indian carriers which were looking forward to sunny days with the receding of the COVID-19 pandemic have hit serious turbulence, as they are now faced with an issue they left unaddressed in the past two years: employees’ dissatisfaction over low pay.

According to PTI, a significant section of aircraft maintenance technicians of IndiGo and Go First have gone on sick leave in the last week to protest against their low salaries. However, despite the staff crunch, both carriers have managed to keep their flight operations unaffected, barring a few embarrassing incidents.