Last Tuesday, a Go Air flight was instructed by air traffic controller (ATC) to abort landing twice on Mumbai airport’s shortened runway. Though the incident was reported widely as a pilot error, it has also brought to the fore the pilots’ inhibitions while approaching the runway that is shortened every Tuesday afternoon for re-carpeting its intersection.

“The pressure to land on the shortened runway on Tuesdays is immense as the margin for error is almost negligible,” said a senior pilot with Kingfisher Airlines.

Although the Mumbai International Airport limited (MIAL) zeroed in on Tuesdays for re-carpeting after taking airlines into confidence at least six months before beginning work in October, pilots say that things which look fine on paper are not actually going great when one zeroes in on their operational details.

“On an average all economy Airbus, A 320 or a Boeing 737 — two most widely used aircraft for domestic travel— carry 180 passengers with a gross take-off weight between 73 tonnes and 77 tonnes. While the airline is asked to reduce the weight to 62 tonnes, ground staff tries to squeeze in every last bit of cargo or passengers that they can, as there is immense commercial pressure on the airline.

In effect, we take off heavier than allowed,” he said.

But the real problem, according to air safety expert Capt Ranganathan, lies in the shortened runway space on which about 80 flight movements take place every Tuesday. “Unfortunately short-field landing is not a part of regular training in most flying schools. Also, when you displace a runway’s threshold halfway down the runway, it creates illusion for the pilots in air,” said Capt Ranganathan.

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