Air Rage in Indian Skies
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Air Rage in Indian Skies
Primarily due to a vastly lagging Airport infrastructure both on the Passanger side as well as on the "Air" side, the instances of Air Rage on India based airlines is increasing day by day. See http://www1.timesofindia.indiatimes....ow/1581023.cms . Unless the air traffic controlling at airports, enroute planning to reduce airport traffic congestion and the basic infrastructure including security clearances at Indian airports improves to actual international standards and beyond, Indian passangers will continue to have problems on the ground ... and create problems for crew in the air. But with the pace of growth of infrastructure the way it is and the contrasting growth of airplanes in the sky and on the ground, it seems "30th in arrival sequence, min clean speed, expect approach at (one hour later)" is not likely to go away soon. Add to it the "future" planning of having only ONE runway at the "New" airports at Hyderabad and Bangalore. How mayopic could the planners be? Seems they will think only when they have to suffer themselves. With so many airlines already having taken to skies and many more waiting in the wings, being "sixtieth" in the arrival sequence and having to carry some 5 hours extra endurance does not seem a distant possibility. 
Don't hope that the primary diversion will be there - coz it will not have parking place as it happened to some of us a few days back. Going to Delhi - plan Mumbai as diversion.
Don't hope that the primary diversion will be there - coz it will not have parking place as it happened to some of us a few days back. Going to Delhi - plan Mumbai as diversion.
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Indian Diversions...
Ahhh India...a wonderful country and such an fascinating place to fly.
We had a good one last year.
Diverting in a 757 from the hold at Agra because of poor Vis (situation exacerbated by the fact that this is mostly a Military base so they do seem to try to keep the weather forecasts Top Secret :-)
In the hold a review of our options;
Number 1 Div was Delhi - fogged out, no clearance forecast.
Number 2 Div was Jaipur - Wx nice but, RAMP FULL of diverted Delhi inbounds! No chance.
Number 3 Div.....was....."erm Ahmedabad? Where's that exactly?.....Over an hour away with the Vis decreasing? Time we 'departed the fix' guys, ask Delhi for a climb to FL 330 and let's go!"
A lovely night was spent in AMD - all very friendly people, although Immigration took some time....(polite cough!)
And so much to be learned too - like Gujarat is a DRY province, the only one (?) in the sub-continent - most disappointing to be denied the pleasure of a Cobra or two with the superb curry buffet in the hotel. (Darn it!)
Seriously though, it's a brilliant experience flying in India but you do have to make sure you keep your options open - as the point is made above, the whole aerospace industry is expanding like crazy out there and with expansion there are always risks and challenges.
More runways would be nice chaps please.
Fly safe, JMcB
We had a good one last year.
Diverting in a 757 from the hold at Agra because of poor Vis (situation exacerbated by the fact that this is mostly a Military base so they do seem to try to keep the weather forecasts Top Secret :-)
In the hold a review of our options;
Number 1 Div was Delhi - fogged out, no clearance forecast.
Number 2 Div was Jaipur - Wx nice but, RAMP FULL of diverted Delhi inbounds! No chance.
Number 3 Div.....was....."erm Ahmedabad? Where's that exactly?.....Over an hour away with the Vis decreasing? Time we 'departed the fix' guys, ask Delhi for a climb to FL 330 and let's go!"
A lovely night was spent in AMD - all very friendly people, although Immigration took some time....(polite cough!)
And so much to be learned too - like Gujarat is a DRY province, the only one (?) in the sub-continent - most disappointing to be denied the pleasure of a Cobra or two with the superb curry buffet in the hotel. (Darn it!)
Seriously though, it's a brilliant experience flying in India but you do have to make sure you keep your options open - as the point is made above, the whole aerospace industry is expanding like crazy out there and with expansion there are always risks and challenges.
More runways would be nice chaps please.
Fly safe, JMcB
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I've been Flying to India for many years and I understand completely why Air rage occurs there.
Airport infrastructure simply sucks and the Indian mentality of "This is my job, this is what I do" rules supreme.
Take a typical recent outbound from Chennai to London, UK passport. Here is what you have to suffer.
1. Step down from the taxi to absolute bedlam, too many beggars to fight off, everyone wants to steal money from me for carrying my bags, I've seen smaller crowds at old Trafford during a Man U v Liverpool game. Literally have to man handle everyone and almost resort to punching the crooks wanting to carry the bags.
2. Not allowed to even enter the departure building unless you have a ticket, so it gets checked at the door by security but at least I am away from the huge crowds.
3. Once in the departure lounge there is a small waiting area devoid of chairs where you are held like cattle, you are not allowed into the main check in area until your check in desk is open. Vast expanses of empty floor space beckons the travellers who look on it with dismay as they fight one another for elbow room. Ticket is again checked by security here.
4. Once your desk is opened you first get your bags X Rayed and sealed before you check them in, nothing abnormal there. But the machine is old and the workers few, takes ages.
5. At the check in desk, Ahhh Bliss. Usual procedure here.
6. Enter the nightmare world of EMIGRATION. you must fill out an emigration form, no one tells you to, or gives you the form or a pen and there are no desks provided, but end up at the front of the emigration queue without one and your turned back and must join the back again.
Usually only one emigration officer is on duty so the queue is enormous, passports and visas are checked despite them not knowing what a UK right of abode or a settlement visa looks like. Spend 20 minutes explaining what these two visas mean (wife and child). Eventually in a flurry of stamps emigration forms and flying elbows and a lost 30 minutes we get through.
7. just past the emigration and in clear view of it, another passport and ticket boarding card check, still I have no idea why this is there.
8. I am at last going up the escalator to the departure lounge, I've been in the airport for 1 hour 30 minutes.
9. Departure lounge looks and smells like a urinal, seats are filthy, carpet has stains all over it from god knows what. No refreshments, no shops to speak of and no decent toilets.
10. Here we enter the world of normality, I greet the friendly CC but am by now so stressed out that if anyone crosses me they will get a black eye.
Herein lies the problem of Air rage in India.
I wont even bother about arrivals or the other airports which are far worse than Chennai.
Airport infrastructure simply sucks and the Indian mentality of "This is my job, this is what I do" rules supreme.
Take a typical recent outbound from Chennai to London, UK passport. Here is what you have to suffer.
1. Step down from the taxi to absolute bedlam, too many beggars to fight off, everyone wants to steal money from me for carrying my bags, I've seen smaller crowds at old Trafford during a Man U v Liverpool game. Literally have to man handle everyone and almost resort to punching the crooks wanting to carry the bags.
2. Not allowed to even enter the departure building unless you have a ticket, so it gets checked at the door by security but at least I am away from the huge crowds.
3. Once in the departure lounge there is a small waiting area devoid of chairs where you are held like cattle, you are not allowed into the main check in area until your check in desk is open. Vast expanses of empty floor space beckons the travellers who look on it with dismay as they fight one another for elbow room. Ticket is again checked by security here.
4. Once your desk is opened you first get your bags X Rayed and sealed before you check them in, nothing abnormal there. But the machine is old and the workers few, takes ages.
5. At the check in desk, Ahhh Bliss. Usual procedure here.
6. Enter the nightmare world of EMIGRATION. you must fill out an emigration form, no one tells you to, or gives you the form or a pen and there are no desks provided, but end up at the front of the emigration queue without one and your turned back and must join the back again.
Usually only one emigration officer is on duty so the queue is enormous, passports and visas are checked despite them not knowing what a UK right of abode or a settlement visa looks like. Spend 20 minutes explaining what these two visas mean (wife and child). Eventually in a flurry of stamps emigration forms and flying elbows and a lost 30 minutes we get through.
7. just past the emigration and in clear view of it, another passport and ticket boarding card check, still I have no idea why this is there.
8. I am at last going up the escalator to the departure lounge, I've been in the airport for 1 hour 30 minutes.
9. Departure lounge looks and smells like a urinal, seats are filthy, carpet has stains all over it from god knows what. No refreshments, no shops to speak of and no decent toilets.
10. Here we enter the world of normality, I greet the friendly CC but am by now so stressed out that if anyone crosses me they will get a black eye.
Herein lies the problem of Air rage in India.
I wont even bother about arrivals or the other airports which are far worse than Chennai.
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I've always wondered about countries with emigration desks. Stinks of Soviet controls to me. But then India and the USSR were cosy for a long time. Good job the concept wasn't around in 1840's Ireland or Boston would look a lot different.
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Don't know for sure, but most Indian beaurocracy dates from colonial times, so I suspect that us Brits are the more likely source! Bombay Duck will know....
Bangalore
I had the misfortune of flying Air India from Bangalore to Dubai, just before Christmas last year:
- the Emigration checks, I agree - it was harder to get out of the country than to get in. I asked a colleague who works there, he says it's to do with young men skipping national service;
- The departure lounge is OK, clean enough, but the departure TV screen didn't list my flight at all. There were about 8 other flights listed for departure in the hour I was waiting, but only one seemed to do any actual boarding;
- I joined a queue that formed at around the scheduled departure time of my flight, and it was the right one. I think it was not listed as a "departure" because it had hopped from Mumbai, which I wasn't aware of;
- Air India managed to over-board the flight, the first time I'd ever heard of that happening: more valid boarding passes than there were seats. My seat was one of them, but I wasn't asked to move, and a good thing too.
- So, I was lucky to get out of there just 90 minutes late. Plane was really old, but the flight was generally OK, food was fine.
Don't know for sure, but most Indian beaurocracy dates from colonial times, so I suspect that us Brits are the more likely source! Bombay Duck will know....
The airports and approaches are slowly getting better. I've heard that the Bombay/Mumbai international airport has seriously upgraded (and I have seen the domestic terminal, it is superb) and I recall reading that Delhi was being re-done too.
Kolkata, Chennai will be bureaucratic nightmares, I can't see them improving quickly. Bangalore should improve fast, because it is now "India's Silicon Valley" (sic) so they're trying everything to spruce the city up...
The skies are a bit of a mess though, and I dont think there are enough people in this country who are applying for jobs like ATC, ground crew et al, and not enough training facilities IMO. We're already importing pilots, I'm sure other branches of aircraft handling will require a similar method of handling...
We flew in and out of Kochi last week, both in and out were late night so not many people around but it was far from pleasant. Getting out was indeed harder than getting in, always bizarre. They had 5 or 6 people to check that you had a little tag on all cabin baggage, including the wife's handbag, then stamp it once it had been through X-ray, then check it had been stamped...
All pax scanned with the handheld thingy after the walk through scanner - women off through a screened off area - so very careful there, good thing (but see later!).
Once on the plane (MI business class) they couldn't serve a beer until the door was closed - what difference does that make??
In the air, I'm gulping the beers down and the mrs is rummaging in her bag, as they do, and showed me her nail clippers that she had inadvertantly forgot to take out and put in the check-in bag! Very effective screening that. Makes you wonder what else they'd miss!!
All pax scanned with the handheld thingy after the walk through scanner - women off through a screened off area - so very careful there, good thing (but see later!).
Once on the plane (MI business class) they couldn't serve a beer until the door was closed - what difference does that make??
In the air, I'm gulping the beers down and the mrs is rummaging in her bag, as they do, and showed me her nail clippers that she had inadvertantly forgot to take out and put in the check-in bag! Very effective screening that. Makes you wonder what else they'd miss!!
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Our Hypocrisy
I find this thread a bit bizzare
A. This should not be in Flight Deck Rumours as this is SLF gossip
B. Are we Really this sad ,Do we not have any sort of patience or respect for some one from different culture or background,
C. Try flying into US of A and check the Immigration there,It is easier to get into Russia then US of A
Please stop slagging people off Nobody is asking you to go anywhere
A. This should not be in Flight Deck Rumours as this is SLF gossip
B. Are we Really this sad ,Do we not have any sort of patience or respect for some one from different culture or background,
C. Try flying into US of A and check the Immigration there,It is easier to get into Russia then US of A
Please stop slagging people off Nobody is asking you to go anywhere
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"Unless the air traffic controlling at airports, enroute planning to reduce airport traffic congestion and the basic infrastructure including security clearances at Indian airports improves to actual international standards and beyond, Indian passangers will continue to have problems on the ground ... and create problems for crew in the air"
Dear Sir,
I quote above from my message. It was written to emphasise the need by the Government of India to look far ahead and plan accordingly. Unfortunately, it does not seem so. It's good to make a swanky looking passanger side of the airports, but the basics - security clearances and Immigration clearances need to be sorted out. Worse is the "Air" side of it. With a single runway in operation at any one time at India's major airports, how can you improve the traffic situation? Even the future airports are planned with single runways!!! While in USA, and Europe, most of the airports have parallel runways.
Today the indian Government is merging Air India and Indian Airlines, but to what avail? The attitude of PEOPLE (whether pilots, cabin crew, ground crew or engineers) needs to change. I wonder on that aspect. While on the one hand the Government tends to mollycoddle the Government airlines like Air India and Indian Airlines (despite losses amounting to hundreds of millions), they seem to treat the other private airlines like a plague affecting the Indian skies and the International routes. They (other airlines operating in India) are not allowed to fly Internaional coz they will eat into the pie of the Government Airlines which offer lousy service, are never ON TIME and are never "passanger friendly". On the other hand ANY new airline with hardly any experience is allowed into Indian skies. What the Government does not seem to realise is that India is loosing revenue to foreign airlines at the cost of India based airlines. The Birtish Raj seems to be still in effect even afer so many years of Independence. 
This is the major malady affecting the Indian skies and the Air Rage that I talked about is likely to continue for some time to come till the Government takes steps to put all Airlines (Government and Private) on the same platform and then carries out an apraisal of it's Behemoth's SWOT analysis when they are forced to compete in an open world.
A similar change is required in the technical upgradation of the Radars, number of controllers and the total airspace management scenerio. There are large gaps in radar and R/T coverage which need to be addressed. Even post flight, a passanger need to be ensured a safe and rationally charged travel to his/her destination. Many such changes are required to be incorporated before India can emerge as a country at par with the rest of the advanced world in terms of airline travel.
Thank you.
Hawk
Dear Sir,
I quote above from my message. It was written to emphasise the need by the Government of India to look far ahead and plan accordingly. Unfortunately, it does not seem so. It's good to make a swanky looking passanger side of the airports, but the basics - security clearances and Immigration clearances need to be sorted out.
Worse is the "Air" side of it. With a single runway in operation at any one time at India's major airports, how can you improve the traffic situation? Even the future airports are planned with single runways!!! While in USA, and Europe, most of the airports have parallel runways. Today the indian Government is merging Air India and Indian Airlines, but to what avail? The attitude of PEOPLE (whether pilots, cabin crew, ground crew or engineers) needs to change. I wonder on that aspect.
While on the one hand the Government tends to mollycoddle the Government airlines like Air India and Indian Airlines (despite losses amounting to hundreds of millions), they seem to treat the other private airlines like a plague affecting the Indian skies and the International routes. They (other airlines operating in India) are not allowed to fly Internaional coz they will eat into the pie of the Government Airlines which offer lousy service, are never ON TIME and are never "passanger friendly". On the other hand ANY new airline with hardly any experience is allowed into Indian skies. What the Government does not seem to realise is that India is loosing revenue to foreign airlines at the cost of India based airlines. The Birtish Raj seems to be still in effect even afer so many years of Independence. This is the major malady affecting the Indian skies and the Air Rage that I talked about is likely to continue for some time to come till the Government takes steps to put all Airlines (Government and Private) on the same platform and then carries out an apraisal of it's Behemoth's SWOT analysis when they are forced to compete in an open world. A similar change is required in the technical upgradation of the Radars, number of controllers and the total airspace management scenerio. There are large gaps in radar and R/T coverage which need to be addressed. Even post flight, a passanger need to be ensured a safe and rationally charged travel to his/her destination. Many such changes are required to be incorporated before India can emerge as a country at par with the rest of the advanced world in terms of airline travel.
Thank you.
Hawk
I don't know whether you have read the posts properly sikeano: and in any event the title of the forum cantains the words "points that affect...lives as professional pilots".
The points made in the first post suggest that the infrastructure is just not up to standard and in my limited experience (one trip), they may well have 10 staff standing around checking tags and stamps and things rather peripheral to on-board safety and security but if they miss basic things in the screening process one cannot help wondering what standard of checking goes on in more critical areas. That would suggest that the infrastructure, hardware and training is not good enough.
I think that could affect lives, don't you?
Culture and background is one thing, but incompetence is quite another.
The points made in the first post suggest that the infrastructure is just not up to standard and in my limited experience (one trip), they may well have 10 staff standing around checking tags and stamps and things rather peripheral to on-board safety and security but if they miss basic things in the screening process one cannot help wondering what standard of checking goes on in more critical areas. That would suggest that the infrastructure, hardware and training is not good enough.
I think that could affect lives, don't you?
Culture and background is one thing, but incompetence is quite another.
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Rush 2112, I quite agree with you the First post is a rant about the clearance to Land in Indian airports and holding 'MELA' as one of my Freind, a Indian pilot likes to put ,Has room to improve .But I do not get it, What does the competence of the Immigration Officers or the Taxi touts, Or the cleaniness of the airport has to do with delays in landing or diverting to another Feild . I have flown to India many times, And I have found whilst I was on Hold even though I am the Number one in the Q,An Regional airline always gets an clearance to land before me So Rush 2112 I suggest you Re-Read your post (which to me sounds like you are an SLF ) Think which part of your post effects an Professional Pilot, And if you think there are 10 People checking the tags remember India is not immune to Terrorist attacks Unlike singapore ,And Manpower is Plenty in the country
Back to my Pint now
P.S. my Apologies this is in SLF Forum
