Pilots stood down after questions about qualifications
A third of the pilots of Pakistan International Airlines have been grounded for flying with fake or dubious licences a month after crew error caused a crash that killed 98 people.
Pilots without adequate experience and technical knowledge obtained their qualifications by paying others to take their examinations, officials said.
The scandal over unqualified pilots became public this week when Ghulam Sarwar Khan, the aviation minister, told the Islamabad parliament that 262 out of 860 airline pilots on the civil aviation register had paid someone else to take their knowledge exams. These pilots ‘‘don’t have flying experience’’, he said.
The minister was presenting details on how the supposedly veteran crew of a PIA
Airbus A320 tried to land on May 22 at
Karachi without extending their undercarriage, then crashed on houses, killing – out of 99 aboard and one on the ground. Khan did not say whether the pilots held legitimate licences.
The airline said that a government inquiry, opened after a 2018 crash, had found that 150 of its 434 pilots were carrying ‘‘either bogus or suspicious licences’’ and were now grounded.
‘‘PIA acknowledges that fake licences are not just a PIA issue but spread across the entire Pakistani airline industry,’’ said Abdullah Hafeez Khan, the airline’s spokesman. He added that some fake Pakistani pilots also flew for foreign carriers.
The global aviation body IATA said the reports ‘‘represent a serious lapse in the licensing and safety oversight by the aviation regulator.’’
There was no explanation of how incompetent pilots could have passed the hands-on flight tests on simulators and aircraft controls that are required for an airline transport pilot licence.
Voice recorders on the May 22 flight showed the pilots were distracted by a conversation about coronavirus, investigators reported. The crash focused attention on the dismal state of the national flag carrier, which has suffered heavy losses and is said to be ridden with corruption, nepotism and political interference. The airline has suffered a string of recent accidents. –