KATHMANDU, JUNE 2

The Airline Operators Association of Nepal (AOAN) has expressed concerns over the notice issued by the Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal (CAAN) stating that domestic airlines would be cleared for take-off only after analysing the en route weather, as well as the weather conditions around the destination airport.

Issuing a press statement today, the association has mentioned that the work to inform about the weather condition is handled by the Meteorological Forecasting Division, and it sends a meteorological aerodrome report (METAR) to the airports in Kathmandu and Bhairahawa every 30 minutes, and in eight other airports every hour. The division also sends terminal area forecast to the Tribhuvan International Airport (TIA) and Bhairahawa Airport every six hours.

The association has mentioned that while the division sends the en route weather reports for international airlines flying over 18,000 metres, such reports are not made available to domestic airlines. The AOAN has called for the CAAN to coordinate with the concerned bodies to make en route weather reports available to all airports in the country to ensure safe flights to rural areas of the country. The In a notice, the Department of Hydrology and Meteorology has already clarified that it couldn't provide instant weather updates as requested by CAAN due to lack of human resources.

Similarly, the association has said the CAAN's decision to require two pilots in one-engine helicopters is impractical. The association has demanded that the decision be reconsidered, taking into account the manufacturer's design objectives and the provisions that are unfavourable to international practice.

On Tuesday, the CAAN had issued a notice stating all the helicopters should be operated by two pilots with immediate effect.

Making a knee-jerk reaction, CAAN had introduced some 'strict rules' in the wake of a fateful crash of Tara air flight 9N-AET on May 29. All 22 passengers onboard the flight were killed. Their bodies have been brought to Kathmandu for postmortem. While a probe committee has been formed by the Ministry of Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal to look into the cause and details of the accident, the preliminary investigation suggests the crash was caused due to bad weather conditions.