NEW DELHI (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 24th June, 2020) The initial report into last month's air crash over Pakistan's Karachi found that the human factor, not any technical faults, were behind the tragedy that killed 97 people, media reported Wednesday.
Speaking to the country's parliament, Aviation Minister Ghulam Sarwar Khan said that overconfidence and lack of focus of the pilots led them to not follow proper procedures and not pay attention to irregularities, English-language Pakistani paper Dawn reported.
"The pilot on the final approach did not identify any technical fault. At a distance of 10 miles from the runway, the plane should have been at an altitude of 2,500 feet but it was around 7,220 feet. This was the first irregularity," Khan said.
According to Khan, the air traffic control, which also shares part of the blame in the report, told the main pilot to correct his altitude but the pilot maintained that all was under control.
"The pilots were discussing the coronavirus throughout the flight. They were not focused. They talked about coronavirus ... their families were affected. When the control tower asked him to decrease the plane's height, the pilot said 'I'll manage'. There was overconfidence," Khan told the National Assembly, according to Dawn's translation.
The plane's angle of approach to the runway was 60 degrees when it should ordinarily be 40 degrees, the minister explained.
The plane failed a first landing attempt and made a loop to attempt a second landing, but an engine had already caught fire by that point. Khan put blame on the air traffic tower for not informing the pilots that they had a fire on board.
The Airbus belonging to Pakistan International Airlines crashed over a residential neighborhood about one mile outside the airport on May 22 killing all 97 people on board.
