NEW DELHI, June 3 (TNS): In a major scare, the VVIP aircraft “Meghdoot” flying Indian foreign minister Sushma Swaraj from Trivandrum to Mauritius, on her way to South Africa, went incommunicado for 12-14 minutes, Indian media reported on Sunday.
The scare happened when Mauritian air traffic control and the crew of the Embraer 135 Legacy flying Swaraj — which was cruising safely — could not establish contact with each other for some time after the plane entered the island nation’s airspace.
“Over oceanic airspace, air traffic control (ATC) globally waits for 30 minutes to declare a plane missing if it does not contact it on entering its airspace of flight information region. In this case, the Mauritius authorities pressed the alarm button 12 minutes after the flight IFC-31 entered its airspace and contact could not be established with the plane,” said a senior official of Airports Authority India (AAI), the parent organisation for ATC here.
On its part, the external affairs ministry denied knowledge of the scare.
Mauritius then declared “INCERFA” alarm, which in aviation parlance means an uncertainty phase wherein it is not known if the aircraft and its occupants are safe. They contacted the Chennai air traffic control, which was the last flight information region (FIR, a specified region of airspace in which a flight information service is provided and it is the largest regular division of airspace globally) to be in touch with the Embraer ERJ135 named “Meghdoot”.
The plane had taken off from Trivandrum at 2.08pm. “The local ATC passed it on to Chennai FIR which later passed it on to Mauritius FIR. (A plane passes through several FIRs and remains in touch with the ATC of that FIR). Once the alarm was sounded, everyone gets vigilant for the plane for which it has been sounded. The Indian ATC may also have tried to contact the plane on VHF,” said the AAI official.
The pilots of the Embraer, for which the alarm was sounded at 4.44 pm, contacted Mauritius ATC at 4.58 pm, after which everyone heaved a sigh of relief. The Embraer does not have a long range and Sushma, who is flying it from India to South Africa to attend a BRICS and India-Brazil-South Africa (IBSA) ministerial meetings, had to take three refuelling or technical stops — Delhi-Trivandrum-Mauritius-South Africa.
A senior ATC official said communication over oceanic area is often problematic due to erratic VHF communication. “Sometimes pilots are unable or forget to contact the Mauritius area. That oceanic area has no radar coverage and everything depends on VHF/HF communication. Such places where VHF coverage is not good are known as dark zones,” said the official.
The 14-minute long uncertainty phase (INCERFA) is first of the three emergency phases under International Civil Aviation Organisation’s Chicago Convention. The second is “alert phase” (ALERFA) in which apprehension exists as to the safety of an aircraft and its occupants. The third is “distress phase” (DETRESFA) wherein there is a reasonable certainty that an aircraft and its occupants are threatened by grave and imminent danger and require immediate assistance.
Luckily, the 14-minute-long scare involving Swaraj’s VVIP plane ended with the first stage itself.
Courtesy: Times of India
