DGCA grounds Pawan Hans choppers

Helicopter services have been suspended, pending investigation into the alleged snag in the emergency locator transmitter on Arunachal Pradesh Chief Minister's chopper

DGCA grounds Pawan Hans choppers

Helicopter services have been suspended, pending investigation into the alleged snag in the emergency locator transmitter on Arunachal Pradesh Chief Minister's chopper

Following the death of former Arunachal Pradesh Chief Minister Dorjee Khandu along with four others in a chopper crash on Saturday, the Pawan Hans commercial helicopter services in the northeast have been suspended.

Tragic: Arunachal CM Dorjee Khandu's body was recovered four days
after his official Pawan Hans chopper went missing. File Pic/AFP

According to sources in Pawan Hans Helicopters Limited (PHHL), Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) was undertaking checks and reviewing its choppers operating in the region yesterday. DGCA would also examine why the advanced emergency locator transmitter (ELT) fitted into Khandu's helicopter did not activate on impact during the crash, they said.

The signals emitted by the emergency locator transmitter helps to locate choppers in case of crashes, and can be picked by ISRO satellites or aircraft flying over the crash site. The unit is normally activated automatically in the event of heavy impact during a crash. Regarding when services would be resumed, sources said that they were confident of restarting after the entire fleet of the company's was carefully examined and declared airworthy.

DGCA sources in Guwahati confirmed that the Pawan Hans helicopter services were not operating in the northeast since the fateful crash. They however, could not confirm if the suspension was following an order from the DGCA or the Civil Aviation Ministry.

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