Wednesday, September 27, 2006

We can't change our geographical locations and therefore settings. We as a mountainous country have to manage our things in such a manner that the geographical locations and the settings do not pose a threat to our development.

The fact is that we have rugged terrains. We can't avoid this situation. Highly scenic snow capped Himalayas , on the one hand, have been a boon to our tourism industry whereas on the other it also pose a threat for the country's overall development.

Since the development of the aviation sector in Nepal , the ruggedness of the terrain has posed to the biggest threat to its development and proved to be a major hindrance to its development.

Frequently occurring accidents along with the loss of properties and also human casualties demonstrate that the civil aviation infrastructure to tackle the ruggedness of the terrain is either insufficient or non existent. Blaming the weather condition or geographical location or even human errors for the loss of properties can not always be justified and taken for granted. It is demonstrated and known to specialists working in the aviation sector that utilizing modern technologies such as satellite based systems harshest terrain can be easily tackled, flights in all weather can be operated and finally human errors can be minimized. This means that we can easily minimize loss of precious human lives as had been the case with the mishap of Shree Airline chopper last weekend.

The Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal which is reportedly utilizing traditional and obsolete equipments to handle one of the world's harshest terrains along with the world's worst weather conditions has been unable to tackle the frequently happening accidents. This means that the authority must live up to the occasion and build technological infrastructures that are available and in use in the world market. The authorities in government can't escape the blame.

The ever increasing private companies in the country can be convinced to invest in building the country's civil aviation infrastructure that is also growing instead of waiting for donor agencies to assist in this regard. Such practices could be well seen in the developed countries in the west and else where as well.

Private sector investment in the state of the art technologies, such as Satellite Based Air Traffic Management system has been pretty successful in handling ever increasing air traffic as well as has become convenient tools to minimize the mishaps happening in the air.

In the context of Nepal, as it is economically not very feasible to lay down Civil Aviation Infrastructure due to the difficult terrain, in the long term Satellite based systems that do not need such infrastructures could prove be more economical and also cold be made available in the remote mountainous locations to avoid such casualties.

The Civil Aviation Authorities must learn now a lesson and act accordingly in order to ensure air safety by bringing in new technologies that have been proven successful without caring what amount it consumes. If not the donors let us do it on our own.

Finally, we express our deep condolence over the loss of precious lives including some of our international friends of Nepal in this fresh chopper crash.

We suppose the government authorities will now take up the issue in its right perspective and install systems that are in use and practice in order to ensure safety of the air passengers.