Uttarakhand: Five Helicopter Operators In Kedarnath Fined By DGCA, Officials Suspended

The irregularities came to light when the DGCA decided to carry an audit of the operators after a helicopter carrying pilgrims to a high altitude made a hard landing on May 31, 2022.

Representative Image

Source : ANI

A fine of Rs 5 lakh each was imposed on five helicopter operators carrying passengers at Kedarnath Dham, reported news agency ANI. Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) fined them over the issue of flight disturbances. Two officials of two other operators were also suspended for three months.

"The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) has imposed this fine for flight disturbances. Along with this, the DGCA has suspended the officials of two other operators for three months for violation of safety rules," said DGCA official, as reported by ANI.

The irregularities came to light when the DGCA decided to carry an audit of the operators after a helicopter carrying pilgrims to a high altitude made a hard landing on May 31, 2022. After the incident a team was formed that carried out spot checks and revealed 'serious violations'. 

#WATCH A helicopter belonging to a private aviation company while landing at Kedarnath helipad had an uncontrolled hard landing on 31st May; no passengers were injured in the incident#Uttarakhand pic.twitter.com/4yskr0aoz5

— ANI UP/Uttarakhand (@ANINewsUP) June 6, 2022

The operators were not maintaining proper flight records in their technical log books either, said the ANI report.

"The Director General of Civil Aviation had constituted a team to conduct spot checks of helicopters involved in shuttle operations in Kedarnath. On June 7 and 8, the team did spot checks which revealed serious violations. After this it was decided to conduct a detailed audit of all the operators involved in Shuttle operations," an official was quoted as saying by ANI.

According to DGCA investigations, a helicopter of Thumby Aviation Pvt Ltd went out of control while landing at the Kedarnath helipad and spun up to 270 degrees to make a very hard landing on May 31. Investigations revealed that the helicopter hit the surface of the helipad hard during touchdown, after which it bounced and after losing direction stabilized on the ground again.