Mumbai: The horrendous crash of an Air India Dreamliner in Ahmedabad on Thursday focuses attention on the safety of hundreds of flights landing and taking off from Mumbai airport daily. A one person who has taken it upon herself to ensure air safety in Mumbai is a former air traffic controller (ATC) and air safety officer (ASO) herself. 

A self-effacing woman, S Mangala, 56, was posted in Mumbai by the Airport Authority of India (AAI). Files from builders seeking permission for their projects coming up in the flight path used to come to her clearance. She went strictly by the book and rejected several applications since the grant of NOC would majorly compromise flight safety.

“My conscience did not permit me to approve their projects, because tomorrow if an airplane crashes into one of these towers, I would feel terribly guilty. In any case, there are clear air safety rules and I went strictly by them,” she said.

However, the builders went to New Delhi and got her orders superseded. That was when Mangala decided to be a whistle-blower to expose the “serious violations of Air Safety Rules” by the Ministry of Civil Aviation (MCA) in general and the AAI in particular. She filed an intervention application in 2014 in a public interest litigation initiated in the Bombay High Court by a Kochi-based advocate. Here we reproduce an interview conducted by the FPJ in March 2023. Excerpts:

What prompted you to start the fight for flight safety?

A childhood incident was responsible for it. I was only 17 years old, studying in Neyveli in Tamil Nadu. My elder brother, an NDA graduate whom I hero worshipped, was an air force navigator on AN32 transport aircraft. Once when I returned home from school, I found him crying like a child on our mother’s lap. He was sad that some of his colleagues were killed in an accident at Ludhiana. It was a nine aircraft formation and he was in aircraft number 3. Aircraft number 6 and 7 collided during the final approach of landing. The year was 1983-84. That scene at my home left a deep impression on me. I subsequently cleared the exams to become an ATC; a job that I regarded as a mission aimed at flight safety. Many of the air accidents could have been avoided if necessary precautions had been taken.

My repeated warnings from 2012 onwards about latent dangerous conditions at Mumbai airport’s main Runway 09/27 and Calicut airport were ignored by the authorities. The same latent dangerous conditions at Calicut airport’s runway resulted in an accident on August 7, 2020, in which 19 innocent passengers and the two pilots were killed. The accident was blamed on pilot error. The pilots are dead and cannot defend themselves.

You have been accused of violating the organisational chain of command in AAI.

Air safety does not need any celebratory protocol. If your immediate superior does not respond to your warnings, then you are at liberty to approach the higher ups. The safety of lakhs of passengers is at stake. It should not be compromised on bureaucratic red tape.

What specific air safety issues did you take up?

With respect to Mumbai, air safety violations are in four categories: unsafe runway conditions, violations of rules framed by international civil aviation safety organisation, AAI and the DGCA, tall buildings within a 20km radius of the airport and non-reporting of air safety incidents to me by Mumbai ATC. More than 85% of accidents take place during take-off or landing when the reaction time for the pilot is very less.

How many buildings are violating air safety norms in Mumbai?

An AAI / MIAL obstacle survey in 2010-11 revealed 439 obstacles on the take-off and landing paths alone. In between buildings were not considered. Apparently, the 2020 survey revealed 1,140 obstacles in the narrow take-off and landing funnels. In 2014, a PIL was filed by a lawyer in Bombay High Court on this issue and in 2018 I was permitted to file a fresh petition. The matter is still pending.

Is it true that you were sacked by the AAI?

The HC judgment permitting me to file a petition was passed on April 6, 2018, and 10 days after that I was dismissed by the AAI. I have challenged my illegal dismissal. I am certain I will win because my fight is for air safety.