‘The pilot as well as the controller didn’t follow the standard rules,’ Pakistan’s aviation minister Ghulam Sarwar Khan told the Parliament while presenting the findings of the report.
A plane crash which killed 97 people in Pakistan last month was because of human error by the pilot and air traffic control, according to an initial report into the disaster released on June 24. (File Photo: AFP)
The Pakistan plane crash in May which killed 97 people, occurred due to human error by the the pilots and air traffic control, an initial inquiry report showed on Wednesday, which says that “the pilots had been discussing the coronavirus pandemic as they attempted to land the plane.”
The Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) plane came down among houses on May 22 after both engines failed as it approached Karachi airport. Only two people had survived after the passenger plane crashed into a densely populated residential area near the Jinnah International Airport.
“The pilot as well as the controller didn’t follow the standard rules,” Pakistan’s aviation minister Ghulam Sarwar Khan told the Parliament while presenting the findings of the report.
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He said the pilots had been discussing the coronavirus pandemic as they attempted to land the Airbus A320.
“The pilot and co-pilot were not focused and throughout the conversation was about coronavirus,” Khan said.
The team investigating the matter, included officials from the French government and the aviation industry. They analysed the data and voice recorders.
According to the aviation minister, the plane was “100 percent fit for flying, there was no technical fault”.
The flight was coming from Lahore to Karachi after the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) allowed limited resumption of domestic flights following two months of lockdown due to the coronavirus pandemic. This was county’s deadliest aviation accident in eight years.
The disaster came as Pakistanis were preparing to celebrate the end of Ramadan and the beginning of Eid al-Fitr, with many travelling back to their homes in cities and villages.
Last year, in June, seventeen people were killed after a small military plane crashed into a residential area in the Pakistani city of Rawalpindi.
In 2016, a Pakistan International Airlines plane burst into flames after one of its two turboprop engines failed while travelling from remote northern Pakistan to Islamabad that killed more than 40 people.
The deadliest air disaster on Pakistani soil was in 2010 when an Airbus 321 operated by private airline Airblue and flying from Karachi crashed into the hills outside Islamabad while coming into land and left all 152 on board dead.
A plane crash which killed 97 people in Pakistan last month was because of human error by the pilot and air traffic control, according to an initial report into the disaster released on June 24.
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