Indonesia VP urges Boeing 737-300 scrutiny after accident
23 Feb 2007 09:44:52 GMT Source: Reuters
By Muhammad Ari JAKARTA, Feb 23 (Reuters) - All Boeing 737-300 aircraft in Indonesia should undergo safety checks, the country's vice president said on Friday, after the transport ministry grounded Adam Air's fleet of the aircraft following an accident. The body of a Boeing 737-300 operated by budget carrier Adam Air cracked and bent in a hard landing on Wednesday at Juanda Airport in Surabaya, Indonesia's second largest city. The Indonesian government has stepped up safety investigations since an Adam Air plane carrying 102 people disappeared in January. That disaster focused attention on the shoddy state of the transport infrastructure in Indonesia and in particular over safety regulations after a host of no-frills budget airlines sprang up in the past few years. "Not only Adam Air, all Boeing 737-300s should be checked," Vice President Jusuf Kalla told reporters. Adam Air has protested the decision to ground its six Boeing 737-300s, almost a third of its fleet, describing it as "harsh punishment". All 148 passengers on the aircraft that made the hard landing were safe, but the accident prompted a temporary closure of the airport. Some legislators have urged the government to conduct a major audit of airlines and overhaul the industry. "Regulators must first undergo a total clean-up, especially the Directorate of Airworthiness Certification," said Abdullah Azwar Anas, a member of a parliamentary commission dealing with transportation. Adam Air has been under scrutiny since one of its Boeing 737-400s disappeared from radar screens on Jan. 1 during a domestic flight from Surabaya to Manado in the north of Sulawesi island. No bodies have been found from the plane, although some debris has been recovered from the sea off South Sulawesi. That accident sparked widespread discussion of Indonesian aviation safety standards and President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono set up a commission to investigate transport safety. Adam Air said Wednesday's incident was caused by strong wind amid heavy rain at the airport, and the plane, made in 1994, had undergone thorough checks before flying. Adam Air, one of about a dozen budget airlines in the world's fourth most populous nation, operates 19 Boeing <BA.N> 737 jets. It serves dozens of domestic routes in Indonesia and also flies to Singapore. Air travel in Indonesia, home to 220 million people, has grown substantially since the liberalisation of the airline industry after the Asian financial crisis in the late 1990s.
