India: SpiceJet flight returns to Delhi after 'autopilot snag'

The airline has been going through a highly-turbulent phase in recent times, on account of several glitches

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By ANI

Published: Fri 2 Sep 2022, 8:33 AM

On Thursday, Airline SpiceJet's Boeing-737 returned to Delhi, after taking off from the Indira Gandhi International Airport.

SpiceJet's VT-SLP aircraft — that took off for Nashik, Maharashtra, from the New Delhi airport — returned after experiencing a malfunction in the flight's autopilot system, according to an official from the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA).

"SpiceJet B737 aircraft VT-SLP, operating flight SG-8363 (Delhi-Nashik) on Thursday was involved in an air turn back due to an autopilot snag," he said.

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However, all the passengers (including the cabin crew) are safe as the flight landed back safely at the airport.

"On September 1, 2022, [the] SpiceJet B737 aircraft scheduled to operate from Delhi to Nashik returned to Delhi, after the flight crew experienced a malfunction with the AutoPilot system. The aircraft made a normal landing at Delhi, and passengers disembarked normally," said SpiceJet Spokesperson.

Meanwhile, SpiceJet has been going through a highly-turbulent phase in recent times, on account of several glitches and a non-adherence to mandated guidelines, in regard to the training of some pilots.

It all started in April 2022, when the aviation regulator restrained 90 pilots of the airline from operating Boeing 737 Max aircraft, after finding that they were not properly trained.

It directed SpiceJet to retrain the pilots, and also levied a fine of Rs1 million from the airline.

Multiple incidents were reported this year, when SpiceJet and other carrier aircraft either turned back to the originating airport, or went on to land at the destination with degraded safety margins.

The DGCA recently ordered SpiceJet to operate a maximum of 50 per cent of its flights for eight weeks, after several of its planes reported technical malfunctions.

Upon having repeated snags, the DGCA Director General, Arun Kumar, recently told ANI that aircraft systems were reasonably robust, and did have multiple redundancies, but component failures did not imply that it was compromising the safety of the passengers.

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ANI

Published: Fri 2 Sep 2022, 8:33 AM

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