Sri Lankan Airlines
 

SriLankan attempts to rein in chaos

April 6, 2012, 9:11 pm

By Rohan Abeywardena

A silent work-to-rule campaign by Sri Lankan pilots for nearly three weeks, which was adding to confusion and mismanagement at the national carrier, was expected to be settled with the bringing back of former Flight Operations Manager Capt. Milinda Ratnayake to tackle pilot rosters from this week, informed aviation sources said yesterday.

They said Ratnayake who was the longest serving Flight Operations Manager of the airline for more than ten years had been moved out as Head of Service Delivery in 2010 and currently served as an ordinary pilot. He was earlier identified as being too close to the previous Emirates management of the airline, but he knew how to keep all pilots on their toes, sources said.

Indiscipline at the airline had reached unbelievable levels with current Head of Flight Operations Capt. Navin de Silva, too, allegedly joining the work-to-rule campaign, sources said.When The Island contacted Capt. De Silva, he however said he was not in a position to comment and directed us to the airline’s Corporate Communications division.

Other pilots, however, charged that there was an excess of pilots numbering more than 280 to fly the 22 aircraft in its service, whereas earlier they had managed with about 205 pilots, but thanks to the excess the work-to-rule campaign had so far gone unnoticed.

Civil aviation sources charged that there had also been a series of incidents involving some pilots incorrectly handling their aircraft. One incident had even caused several million dollars loss to the carrier, they said.

If they have an excess of pilots why are they recruiting so frequently??

I think they have lost about 75% of the expats recruited in 2010/2011...

"pilots incorrectly handling the aircraft" - really? But their SOPs rule!

Good decision or not???
 

I had applied for a captain seat with SLA about 2 months ago and they offered to hire me, subject to of course passing a check when there, but after giving it due consideration I declined the offer. I had heard not too many good things about them plus I did not like the pay, accomodation and other things. I am wondering if I made the RIGHT choice, any input would be appreciated from those who are in the know or guys flying there now.

Argh, back to the good old days again for UL :p

I split my coffee from laughter with the comment of keeping the drivers on their toes.

Good luck guys and girls, it can only get better by the sounds of it anyway. :ok: