The action of Transportation Ministry to avoid Air Transportation Accident

By: Ajeng Mufadillah)*

The aviation industry in Indonesia has increased significantly from year to year. It can be seen from the number of air transport passengers who show high growth compared to other transportation.

In 2016 an increasing number of domestic passenger air transportation as much as 89,358,457 passengers, up 16.61 percent compared to 2015. While marine transportation increased by only about 0.52 percent and by 7.94 percent trains. But the aviation industry growth in Indonesia is still overshadowed by the plane crash.

Data from the National Transportation Safety Committee (NTSC) in 2016 happened 19 accident and serious incident 26. It increased from 2015 that recorded the accident 11 and 17 serious aircraft incident.

In its official statement, Sunday (05/03/2017) The Director General of Civil Aviation Ministry, Agus Santoso said that in accordance with the mandate of the Minister of Transportation Budi Karya Sumadi that transportation must prioritize safety and security without forgetting the service to passengers.

Agus added, there are some things that need to be considered by stakeholders at the national airline. Whether it’s airline operators, airport manager, manager of air navigation, BMKG and the Airport Authority.

Associated operators, for the airline, asked to be serious in implementation procedures set forth in the company operations manual (COM), company maintenance manual (CMM) and a safety management system (SMS).

Business should also keep the airline simulator training with an updated database according to the pilot operating area. If operating in Papua then required to do mountaineous pilot training flying. Operators are required to operate the aircraft adjusted to the facility and technical specifications airport operations given the frequent occurrence of runway excursion.

The management of the airline had to conduct field monitoring (on-duty) by the station to its territory out randomly and alternately as a short-term shock therapy, especially to the Papua region particularly vulnerable to the events.

Agus also reminded to all holders of AOC, PSC 141 OC and mandatory implementation of regulations consistently. Related aerodrome manager, for managing airports, Agus reminded that complied with CASR 139 in terms of the inspection and maintenance of the runway (rubber deposit removal, timely overlay, overlay weakspot, and monitoring of foreign object debris).

Business in particular aerodrome BUBU holder holder must have tool for measuring the roughness of the runway (skid resistance) which refers to the regulations KP 94 2015 on Guidelines for Construction Maintenance Program Airport Pavement (Pavement management system). So there is no reason to postpone the schedule until maturity exceeding roughness measurement runway waiting for examination by Flight Center.

To improve the safety of services, the airports are given the task to provide information on the water surface elevation of the runway in real time which is forwarded to ATC and subsequently communicated to the pilot. It is intended that the pilot can perform calculation landing distance on a wet runway. Therefore we need a water level gauge (standing water) on the surface of the runway because Indonesia is a country with high rainfall.

Airport organizer must also firmly associated closure of the airport at the time was below the minimum limit (visibility and water). So no pilot try to land on the condition.

Business major airports have to provide guidance and oversight of the aerodrome (airstrip) operation is not in accordance with the standards of airport. Across the airstrip also required the existence of airport personnel.

Related managing air navigation, Agus also said that the management of air navigation immediately perform the installation of navigational equipment that are standards in the area of ​​Eastern Indonesia given the number of navigation equipment at the site is still lacking. Such equipment such as ILS, ADS-B, NDB, VOR and DME. Business air traffic are required to provide special procedures (PBN) in the air space Papua.

For aircraft operating in the mountaineous area, especially for small aircraft (normal category) need to be equipped with communications equipment which is adequate considering HF communication tool even more ineffective functioning communications equipment SSB. In the case of restricted can be used for a specific time period using SSB communication tool.

Management of airports should be done with the same goal, namely to promote the airport by providing superior service to its customers not only meets the needs of individuals in it. So it is appropriate that the government participate in controlling the movement of all airports in Indonesia by providing referrals on all airports management authority and provide maximum guarantees in the movement in the future. So that it can reduce the number of air transport accidents.

)* The author is CIDISS contributor