SriLankan airlines said that at no point had it compromised on the safety of the aircraft and its passengers.
The Airline, in a statement today, insisted that it has a Safety Management System, part of which is flight data monitoring on a continuous basis through the digital flight data that is received from the aircraft. This is used to identify any event that exceeds the pre-set profiles of the flight and is flagged as a deviation. Pre-set profiles are applicable to a particular aircraft type and sector and are in line with Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) of the Airline.
The Flight Safety Section of the Airline monitors these trends on a continuous basis and identifies any deviations which are safety critical. In this process the Airline confirmed that it had not found any instances which exceeded the pre- set profiles which were safety critical nor any evidence of instances of Flight Crew deactivating certain functional and vital flight instruments/engines/systems in flights (including the IRS) engaged in commercial passenger operations with a view to getting an opportunity to practicing certain abnormal and emergency conditions, as mentioned in the Article and as mentioned in quoted letter of the Direction General of Civil Aviation.
However, the airline said there was a case of an inflight turn back due to suspected engine high vibration. As the pilot’s occurrence report had not given sufficient details to identify the root cause of the said vibration SriLankan Engineering requested Airbus Industries for an in depth report of the Digital Flight Data Recordings (DFDR) pertaining to that particular flight. As per the report, the Airline found that the Flight Crew which operated that particular flight had deviated from the SOP’s of the Company.
The Airline says it appointed a panel of inquiry consisting of the most senior instructor pilots, which, after due inquiry found that the Flight Crew had violated SOPs of the Company but not to the effect of simulating conditions with passengers on board as stated in the Article. The Company based on the findings of the Inquiring Panel has taken appropriate action vis – a – vis the Fight Crew to address such violation.
SriLankan Airlines reiterated that it has an unblemished safety record and its crews have been trained in keeping with the highest international standards which have been recognised as such by the regular inspections and audits conducted both by the Civil Aviation Authority of Sri Lanka and other international institutions such as International Air Transport Association’s (IATA) Operational Safety Audit (IOSA). The last such IOSA audit was conducted in December 2014 at which the Airline was re-certified.
